from his lips, “What the hell?”
Jeanette Crane Walker, 41
Jeanette Crane Walker, a native of Red Paint, died of unnatural causes on June 14. Jean should be remembered for the brutal attack she suffered 25 years ago in her hometown. Her family moved away from Bowling Green Road shortly thereafter. She is survived by her husband, who will miss her eternally.
Jean Walker. It stunned him, the girl he knew, his graduation date, announced dead in his own paper. He pictured the last time he saw her, running up the slope toward the Bayswater Inn, holding up her long dress so she wouldn’t trip. He had started to run after her but stopped because he didn’t want to appear to be chasing, if anyone was looking. By the time he reached the inn she was gone.
Margaret hurried over from her desk. “Typo, boss?”
“This obit, where did it come from?”
She read it over his shoulder. “I think that’s the late copy that came in Tuesday afternoon. We pulled a house ad to run it.”
“Who wrote it?”
“Barbara does all the late items.”
Simon looked about the newsroom, empty except for the two of them. “Where is she?”
“In the ladies’, I guess.” Margaret leaned against his desk. “Did you know this Jeanette Crane Walker?”
This Jeanette Crane Walker, as if she were merely a name in the paper, not flesh and blood. “Yes, I knew her. Everybody knew everybody in Red Paint twenty-five years ago.”
“That must have been a big story, a brutal attack.”
“No, Margaret, there wasn’t any story. There wasn’t any attack.”
Barbara came through the back door, sipping a Diet Coke through a straw. Simon waved her over. “Where did you get the copy for this obit?”
She dropped her soda can into the metal trash basket beside his desk, and the loud noise of it jolted them all. “Sorry,” she said. “What did you want to know?”
“Where did you get this obit?”
“A man came in Tuesday afternoon when you were all out back, and he had the information already written up the way he wanted it, so I rushed it in since we didn’t have any other obits for the week.”
“You didn’t check his sources?”
She looked over to Margaret for help. “I didn’t know we check sources on obits.”
“That’s because funeral homes send them in. This one just walked in the door. Anybody could come in and place an obit saying someone died when they haven’t.”
Barbara looked shocked. “You mean the woman isn’t dead?”
“That’s not the point. Suffered a brutal attack—that didn’t strike you as a claim you should question?”
“Yes—I mean no, it didn’t then, but it should have, yes. Should I call the police to see if they have any record of it?”
“No,” Simon said, “it was twenty-five years ago. There wouldn’t be any record of it. Besides, the obit has run.”
He runs the shower as hot as the faucet allows and rubs the fresh bar of soap over his body in long sweeps of his hand. An Irish Spring scent seeps into his skin. He stands under the blistering spray as long as he can take it and then shuts off the faucet. He dries himself, then drapes the wet towel over the curtain rod, one quarter inside, just enough to hold it on, the rest on the outside to dry. His whole self appears to him now in the full length of the door mirror. It’s been so long since he’s seen himself like this. His thin body has filled out over the years, rounding his shoulders, thickening his thighs. He brushes a hand slowly down his chest, following the line of dark hair to his rounded stomach, then farther down. He has a few minutes to spare.
———
It is a casual affair, the twenty-fifth reunion of Red Paint High. Women in slimming black slacks and colored tops. Men in Dockers pants and L.L. Bean shirts, the same as they have been wearing for decades. Paul comes down the broad stairway of the inn in dark jacket and gray slacks, complemented by a modest tie, maroon in color, asserted by a gold pin stuck in the center. He looks prosperous and well fed, a man who has gone off from Red Paint and done well for himself. Just outside the dining room door stands Gus, the six-foot-high wooden black bear in overalls, with a menu protruding from his belly. Paul scratches under the bear’s chin, as everyone in town always did for good luck, and enters through the double doors.
“Excuse me, have you registered?”