exaggerated eye roll and sighed really loudly while Mooner grumped back into the apartment to get his shoes. Great. I wasn't even strung out and now I was PMSing, too.
SITTING IN A coffeehouse leisurely sipping a latte wasn't on my morning schedule, so I opted for the McDonald's drive-through, where the breakfast menu listed french vanilla lattes and pancakes. They weren't Grandma-caliber pancakes, but they weren't bad, either, and they were easier to come by.
The sky was overcast, threatening rain. No surprise there. Rain is de rigueur for Jersey in April. Steady, gray drizzle that encourages statewide bad hair and couch potato mentality. In school they used to teach us April showers bring May flowers. April showers also bring twelve-car pileups on the Jersey Turnpike and swollen, snot-clogged sinuses. The upside to this is that we frequently have reason to shop for new cars in Jersey, and we're recognized worldwide for our distinctive nasal version of the English language.
"So how's your head?" I asked Mooner on the way home.
"Filled with latte. My head is mellow, dude."
"No, I mean how are the twelve stitches you have in your head?"
Mooner felt along the Band-Aid. "Feels okay." He sat for a moment with his lips slightly parted and his eyes searching the back recesses of his mind, and then a light flicked on. "Oh yeah," he said. "I was shot by the scary old lady."
That's the good part about smoking pot all your life . . . no short-term memory. Something horrible happens to you and ten minutes later you can't remember a thing.
Of course, that's also the bad part about smoking pot, because when disaster strikes, like your friend goes missing, there's the possibility that important messages and events are lost in the haze. And there's the possibility that you could hallucinate a face in the window when the shot was actually fired by a passing car.
In the case of the Mooner, the possibility was a good probability.
I drove past Dougie's house to make sure it hadn't burned down while we slept.
"Everything looks okay," I said.
"Looks lonely," Mooner said.
WHEN WE GOT back to my apartment Ziggy Garvey and Benny Colucci were in the kitchen. They each had a mug of coffee and a piece of toast.
"Hope you don't mind," Ziggy said. "We were curious about your new toaster."
Benny gestured with his toast. "This is excellent toast. See how evenly brown it is. Not burned on the edges at all. And it's crisp throughout."
"You should get some jelly," Ziggy said. "Some strawberry jelly would be good on this toast."
"You broke into my apartment again! I hate when you do that."
"You weren't home," Ziggy said. "We didn't want it to look like you had men loitering in your hall."
"Yeah, we didn't want to sully your good name," Benny said. "We didn't think you were that kind of girl. Although there's been a lot of rumors throughout the years about you and Joe Morelli. You should be careful of him. He has a very bad reputation."
"Hey, look," Ziggy said. "It's the little fruit. Where's your uniform, kid?"
"Yeah, and what's with the Band-Aid? You fall off your high heels?" Benny asked.
Ziggy and Benny elbowed each other and laughed as if this were some great inside joke.
An idea skittered through my head. "You guys wouldn't happen to know anything about the need for the Band-Aid, would you?"
"Not me," Benny said. "Ziggy, you know anything about that?"
"I don't know nothing about it," Ziggy said.
I leaned back against the kitchen counter and crossed my arms. "So what are you doing here?"
"We thought we should check in," Ziggy said. "It's been a while since we talked, and we wanted to see if anything new turned up."
"It's been less than twenty-four hours," I said.
"Yeah, that's what we said. It's been a while."
"Nothing's turned up."
"Gee, that's too bad," Benny said. "You come so recommended. We had high hopes you could help us."
Ziggy finished his coffee, rinsed the mug in the sink, and set it on the dish drain. "We should be going now."
"Pig," Mooner said.
Ziggy and Benny paused at the door.
"That's a rude thing to say," Ziggy said. "We're gonna overlook it because you're Miss Plum's friend." He looked to Benny for backup.
"That's right," Benny said. "We're gonna overlook it, but you should learn some manners. It's not right to talk to old gentlemen like that."
"You called me a fruit!" Mooner yelled.
Ziggy and Benny looked at each other, perplexed.
"Yeah?" Ziggy said. "So?"
"Next time feel free to loiter in the hall," I said.