Page 49 of Things We Never Got Over (Knockemout)
I wondered how much living she’d missed out on wasting all that time being good.
I followed the Tina line a little deeper, discovering a trail on Pennsylvania District Magistrate court cases and then again in New Jersey and Maryland. DUIs, possession, skipping out on rent. She’d done time about twelve years ago. Not much, but enough to have made a point. Enough to have her becoming a mother less than a year later and steering clear of the cops.
I went back to Naomi’s Facebook and stopped on a family picture from her teenage years. Tina scowling, with her arms crossed next to her sister as their parents beamed behind them. I didn’t know what went on behind closed doors. But I did know that sometimes a bad seed was just a bad seed. No matter what field it was planted in, no matter how it was tended, some just came up rotten.
A glance at the clock reminded me I only had a little time before my two o’clock. Which meant I should get back to the ad campaigns.
But unlike Naomi, I didn’t like worrying about what I “should” do. I typed her name into a search engine and had immediate regrets.
Warner Dennison III and Naomi Witt announce their engagement.
This Dennison guy looked like the kind of asshole who hung out on golf courses and always had a story to top everyone else’s. Sure, he was Vice President of Whatever. But it was at a company with his last name on it. I doubted that he’d earned his fancy title. Judging from her face this morning, this Warner suit had never taken a piss in the great outdoors.
Naomi looked heart-stoppingly gorgeous, not to mention happy, in the formal photo. Which for some stupid reason annoyed me. What did I care if she was into men who ironed their pants? My next-door neighbor was no longer any of my damn business. I’d found her and Way a place to stay. Anything that happened from here on out was her own problem.
I closed out of the window on my screen. Naomi Witt no longer existed to me. I felt good about that.
My phone buzzed on the desk, and Waylon’s head popped up.
“Yeah?” I answered.
“Vernon’s here. Want me to get him started?” Jeremiah offered.
“Get him a whiskey. I’m on my way out.”
“Will do.”
“There he is!” Vernon Quigg called when I returned to the shop. The retired Marine was six feet tall, seventy years old, and the proud owner of an impeccable walrus moustache.
I was the only person allowed near the ’stache with scissors. It was both an honor and an annoyance, seeing as how the man loved nothing more than fresh gossip.
“Afternoon, Vernon,” I said, clipping the cape around his neck.
“Heard about you and Not Tina throwin’ down in Café Rev yesterday,” he said gleefully. “Sounds like those twins are carbon copies of each other.”
“I heard that she’s the complete opposite of her sister,” Stasia said, plopping down in the empty chair next to my station.
I reached for my comb and
gritted my teeth.
“I heard there’s a warrant out for Tina and Not Tina helped her escape,” said Doris Bacon, owner of Bacon Stables, a farm with a reputation for turning out champion horseflesh.
Fuck me.
ELEVEN
BOSS FROM HELL
Naomi
I accepted the leather and denim apron Sherry “Fi” Fiasco handed me and tied it around my waist.
“Shirt looks good,” Sherry said, giving my Honky Tonk v-neck an approving nod.
“Thanks,” I said and tugged nervously at the hem. The shirt was tight and showed more cleavage than I was used to accentuating. But, per my research at the library, ladies with their “girls” showing tended to make higher tips.
Honky Tonk felt like a country bar that had a brief but satisfying affair with a glitzy speakeasy. I liked the “fancy cowboy” vibe.
