a Laundromat," I said and left the room. If Tolliver said anything, I was out of there too fast to hear it. We needed a break from each other.
I inquired at the motel desk, and the clerk gave me really good directions to a large and clean place about a mile away. We always keep a stock of quarters, and we carry detergent and dryer sheets in the trunk. I was good to go.
There was an attendant in the Laundromat, an older woman with crisp white hair and a comfortable body. She was sitting at a little table, reading, and she glanced up when I came in to give me a nod of acknowledgment. Since it was the weekend, the place was busy, but after a little searching I spotted two empty machines side by side. I found a plastic chair and dragged it over, and after I'd loaded the machines and gotten them started, I sat down and pulled my book out of my purse.
I could read, now that I was away from Tolliver's brooding presence. I don't know why that was so. But it was kind of nice to have bustle and people around me, and it was reassuring to have the achievement of clean clothes.
I was at peace. There weren't any bodies around. For a blissful period, I couldn't hear any buzz at all in my head.
From time to time I looked around me to make sure I wasn't in anyone's way, and I saw a woman about my own age looking at me when I raised my head when the spin cycle was almost over.
"Are you that woman?" she asked. "Are you the psychic woman who finds bodies?"
"No," I said instantly. "I've heard that before, but I work at the mall."
That's what I always said when I was in an urban area. It had always worked before. There was always a mall, and it provided a reasonable explanation for the questioner to have seen me before.
"Which mall?" the woman asked. She was pretty, even wearing her weekend sloppy clothes, and she was persistent.
"I'm sorry," I said, with an appropriate smile, "I don't know you." I shrugged, which was supposed to mean, I'm sure you're okay, but I don't want to discuss my personal information with you anymore.
This gal just didn't pick up on the cue. "You look just like her," she said, smiling at me as if that ought to make me happy.
"Okay," I said, and began pulling clothes out of the washers. I had already appropriated one of the rolling carts.
"If you were her, your brother would be somewhere around," the woman said. "I'd sure like to meet him; he looks hot."
"But I'm not her." I rolled my cart away with everything else thrown in it along with the wet clothes. I had to stay long enough to dry them. I couldn't leave now. If there was anything in the world I didn't want to do, it was talk to this woman about my life, my activities, and my Tolliver.
The woman watched me the rest of the time I was in the Laundromat, though she didn't approach me again, thank God. I pretended to read while our clothes tumbled, I pretended to be absorbed in folding them when they were dry, and I made up my mind that as far as I was concerned, she simply wasn't there. This technique had worked for me in the past.
By the time I was ready to load the clothes into the car, I figured I'd gotten clean away. But no-here she came, following me out into the parking lot.
"Don't talk to me again," I said, shaken and at the end of my rope.
"You are her," she said with a smug nod of her head.
"Leave me alone," I said, and got in the car and locked the door. I waited to drive away until after she'd reentered the Laundromat. I hoped that someone had stolen her clothes while she'd come out to look at me some more.
At least now I knew she couldn't follow me. But I did look into the rearview mirror a few times, just to be sure, which was how I noticed the car that actually was following me. It was hard to be sure, since it was dark by now, but since the area was so urban and well lighted, I was sure I was seeing the same gray Miata in my rearview mirror. I pressed the speed dial number for Tolliver.
"Hey," he said.
"Someone's following