waited tables.”
“It’s probably a lot like riding a bicycle, isn’t it?” Ali returned. “Once you learn, you never forget how. Besides, as far as I can tell, you haven’t changed the menu. Looks like the same old same old to me.”
“But-” Edie began.
Ali cut off her mother’s objection. “Look, Mom, if I can look after Matt and Julie’s kitty, I can certainly help you out. At least until you find someone better.”
“I just thought…”
“You think I’m too good to wait tables?” Ali asked.
“Well, yes,” Edie admitted.
“I’m not. Your owning and running the Sugarloaf was good enough to keep a roof over our heads when I was growing up and when I was going to NAU. Helping you and Daddy out now that you’re in a pinch is the least I can do. Besides, the station’s still sending me a paycheck until the end of my contract. That’ll make me the highest- priced waitress the Sugarloaf has ever seen.”
“But shouldn’t you be out looking for another job?”
“You mean shouldn’t I be looking out for me instead of looking out for you?”
“Well, yes,” Edie agreed reluctantly. “I suppose that is what I mean.”
Ali went over to her mother and gathered her into her arms. “You and Dad raised me better than that, Mom. This is payback.”
When Edie emerged from her daughter’s embrace, her eyes were bright with tears. “All right, then,” she said. “You’re hired. But only for the short term and only until I can find someone else. Assuming I manage to open the restaurant tomorrow morning, you can start then.”
They settled in to wait for Bob to return from surgery. Being back in a hospital setting made Ali uncomfortable. It brought back too many bad memories of the days and weeks she’d spent with Dean, and her waiting skills were shaky at best. She tried to sit still, but couldn’t. She kept looking at her watch, twitching, and willing the surgery to be over so she could leave. Finally Edie lost patience.
“Look, Ali,” she said. “There’s no sense in both of us sitting here fidgeting. Go for a walk or for a ride or else bring Chris something to eat. Doing what you’re doing is driving me nuts.”
“I could do with some Kentucky Fried Chicken,” Chris said. “I saw one not too far from here.”
They drove through the cold, clear night to a steamy and almost deserted KFC. After the man behind the counter took their order for one bucket of Original, Ali changed her mind and ordered a second.
“Mom,” Chris objected. “I’m hungry, but I’m not that hungry.”
“I want to stop by Reenie’s place to check on Howie,” she said. “There’ll most likely be a crowd of people there who’ll be as happy to see some KFC as you are.”
She dropped Chris back at the hospital and then headed for Kachina Trail. Once outside the Bernard place she was surprised to find that the expected gathering of friends and neighbors hadn’t materialized. There were no other vehicles parked anywhere nearby-not in front of the garage and not out on the street, either. The windows were uniformly dark. The only sign of occupancy was a single porch light burning on the front porch.
He’s probably not even home, Ali told herself. I should have stayed at the hospital.
Grabbing the fragrant bucket of chicken, Ali made her way gingerly up the icy sidewalk past the dwindling snowman. The afternoon sun had diminished him even more, and now the snowman was little more than a knee- high ghost in the reflected glow of the porch light.
Sure she was on a fool’s errand, Ali rang the bell. Seconds later, though, a light came on somewhere in the interior of the house, followed shortly thereafter by a lamp in the living room. The dead bolt clicked. When Howie opened the door to let Ali in, he was holding a cordless phone to his ear. He smiled in welcome and drew Ali inside before shutting the door behind her. He swayed slightly on his feet as he turned to go back into the house. His ungainly walk and the smell of liquor on his breath told Ali that he’d had at least one drink and probably several more than that.
“Your mother’s friend Ali is here,” he said into the phone. Then, after a pause, he added. “Just a minute. I’ll ask her. It’s Matt. He wants to know how Samantha is doing.” The words slurred slightly and ran together.
“Tell him she’s fine,” Ali said. “She’s out of her crate and making herself at home.”
Without waiting for directions, Ali took the bucket of chicken out to the kitchen and set it on the counter. She and Diane Holzer had cleaned up the breakfast dishes earlier that morning. It appeared that the kitchen had remained unchanged since then. That probably meant that no one else had stopped by to visit with Howie, which struck Ali as odd. People usually rallied round bereaved spouses-even unfaithful ones-no matter what.
When she returned to the living room and took a seat on the couch, Howie was finishing up his phone call. “You be good now,” he was saying. “Don’t give Grandma and Grandpa any trouble. And I’ll come get you soon. Tomorrow probably, or else the next day…Right…Love you, too. Good night, Matty. Talk to you tomorrow.”
He put down the phone. He turned unsteadily in Ali’s direction and gave her a boozy hug. “Thanks so much for coming,” he mumbled. “After what I’ve been through the past few days and hours, it’s good to see a friendly face.”
“What’s been going on?”
“The cops put me through hell today, that’s what!” he said. “I didn’t ask for an attorney at first because I didn’t think I needed one. I thought they were just going to ask me a few routine questions like when did Reenie leave, what time was she supposed to get back, that kind of thing. And they did ask those things at first. But later on they came after me like gangbusters. They kept after me for hours on end, even though I told them I had an alibi, even after I offered to take a lie detector test-which I took and passed by the way-and even after that. From the way they treated me, I thought I was on my way to jail for sure. I was afraid I wasn’t coming back.”
“But you did,” Ali interjected. “You’re here.”
“That’s right. I am here! About an hour or so ago, they found Reenie’s suicide note and suddenly everything changed to sweetness and light. Suddenly I’m no longer the scumbag husband/homicide suspect. Now it’s ‘yes, Mr. Bernard,’ and ‘no, Mr. Bernard,’ and ‘of course you’re free to go, Mr. Bernard,’ and all that happy crap.
“They found a note?” Ali asked.
Howie nodded. “In the car. Or in whatever’s left of the car. They didn’t find it until just a little while ago.”
Ali felt numb. “What did it say?” she asked.
Howie shrugged. “That she couldn’t face dragging it out. That this way would be better for all of us-that she wanted to spare us.”
He paused long enough to wipe a tear from the corner of his eye, but Ali was having a hard time sorting out the conversation. Was Howie Bernard grieving for his dead wife or for himself. It was hard to tell. Maybe it was a little of both.
“So it really was suicide?” Ali asked.
“Of course it was suicide,” he replied. “What else could it have been?”
A bottle of Oban single malt scotch sat on the coffee table in front of them. Howie reached over, poured another generous shot or two into a tumblersized glass, and nodded. “At least now I can go ahead and plan the funeral. It’ll be Friday, by the way. Two o’clock. At Reenie’s old Lutheran church down in Cottonwood. She’ll be buried there, too, in the family plot.”
He stopped and looked at Ali a little fuzzily. “I’m forgetting my manners,” he said. “Can I get you something? A drink? Some of that chicken you brought?”
Ali shook her head. “I’m fine,” she said.
For several seconds, he stared morosely into his glass. “It’s good of you to drop by, Ali. I really appreciate it. As for the rest of my so-called friends, who needs ’em? Where the hell were they when the cops were busy accusing me of putting Reenie in a car and running her off a cliff to get rid of her? I mean, just because…”
Even drunk he must have realized that he was rambling on more than he should have. He stopped.
“Because what?” Ali prodded eventually.
“Nothing,” he muttered. “Not important.”
“It is important,” she insisted. “Tell me.”
Howie gave her an odd look. Finally he answered. “Reenie and I may have been having our little difficulties, but for them to think that I’d kill her…it’s utterlypre…pre…preposterous.” It took three tries before he managed to get his tongue around the word.
