House Rules: A Novel Read online

  Theo’s face turns bright red. “Just Google it.”

  “Just tell me.”

  “It’s when a guy and a girl who aren’t going out hook up, all right?”

  My mother considers this. “You mean like … have sex?”

  “Among other things …”

  “And then what happens?”

  “I don’t know!” Theo says. “They go back to ignoring each other, I guess.”

  My mother’s jaw drops. “That is the most demeaning thing I’ve ever heard. This poor girl shouldn’t just tell that guy to go jump in a lake, she ought to slash all four of his car tires, and—” Suddenly she pins her gaze on Theo. “You haven’t treated a girl like that, have you?”

  Theo rolls his eyes. “Can’t you be like other mothers and just ask me if I’m smoking weed?”

  “Are you smoking weed?” she says.

  “No!”

  “Do you have friends with benefits?”

  Theo pushes back from the table and stands up in one smooth move. “Yeah. I have thousands. They line up outside the front door, or haven’t you noticed them lately?” He dumps his plate in the sink and runs upstairs.

  My mother reaches for a pen she’s tucked into her ponytail (she always wears a ponytail, because she knows how I feel about loose hair swishing around her shoulders) and begins to scrawl a response. “Jacob,” she says, “be a sweetheart and clear the table for me, will you?”

  And off goes my mother, champion of the confused, doyenne of the dense. Saving the world one letter at a time. I wonder what all those devoted readers would think if they knew that the real Auntie Em had one son who was practically a sociopath and another one who was socially impractical.

  I’d like a friend with benefits, although I’d never admit that to my mother.

  I’d like a friend, period.

  For my birthday last year my mother bought me the most incredible gift ever: a police scanner radio. It operates by receiving frequencies that regular radios cannot—ones assigned by the federal government in the VHF and UHF range above the FM stations, and which are used by police, fire, and rescue crews. I always know when the highway patrol is sending out the sanding trucks before they arrive; I get the special weather alerts when a nor’easter is coming. But mostly I listen to the police and emergency calls, because even in a place as small as Townsend you get a crime scene every now and then.

  Since Thanksgiving alone, I have gone to two crime scenes. The first was a break-in at a jewelry store. I rode my bike to the address I heard on the scanner and found several officers swarming the storefront for evidence. It was the first time I got to see spray wax being used on snow to cast a footprint, a definite highlight. The second crime scene was not really a crime scene. It was the house of a kid who goes to my school, who is a real jerk to me. His mother had called 911, but by the time they got there she was standing at the front door, her nose still bleeding, saying that she didn’t want to press charges against her

  husband.

  Tonight I have just gotten into my pajamas when I hear a code on the scanner that is different from any I’ve ever heard, and I’ve heard plenty:

  10–52 AMBULANCE NEEDED.

  10–50 MOTOR VEHICLE ACCIDENT.

  10–13 CIVILIANS PRESENT AND LISTENING.

  10–40 FALSE ALARM, PREMISES SECURE.

  10–54 LIVESTOCK ON HIGHWAY.

  Right now, though, I hear this:

  10–100

  Which means, Dead body.

  I don’t think I’ve ever gotten dressed so quickly in my life. I grab a composition notebook, even though it’s a used one, because I don’t want to waste any time; and I scrawl down the address that keeps getting mentioned on the scanner. Then I tiptoe downstairs. With any luck my mother is already asleep and won’t even know I’m gone.

  It’s bitterly cold out, and there are about two inches of snow on the ground. I’m so excited about the crime scene that I am wearing sneakers instead of boots. The wheels of my mountain bike skid every time I go around a turn.

  The address is a state highway, and I know I have reached the right spot because there are four police cars with their flashing blues on. There is a wooden stake with police tape (yellow, not orange) fluttering in the wind, and a visible trail of footprints. An abandoned car, a Pontiac, sits on the side of the road covered in ice and snow.

  I take out my notebook and write: Vehicle has been abandoned for at least twelve hours, prestorm.

  I duck into the edge of the woods as another police car arrives. This one is unmarked and ordinary, except for the domed police light magnetically affixed to the top. The man who gets out of it is tall and has red hair. He is wearing a black overcoat and heavy boots. On one of his hands, he has a Dora the Explorer Band-Aid.

  I write this in my notebook, too.

  “Captain,” an officer says, coming out from between the trees. He’s dressed in a uniform, with heavy gloves and boots, too. “Sorry to call you in.”

  The captain shakes his head. “What have you got?”

  “A jogger found a body in the woods. Guy’s half naked and there’s blood all over him.”

  “Who the hell goes jogging at night in the dead of winter?”

  I follow them into the woods, careful to stay in the shadows. There are searchlights illuminating the area around the body, so that the evidence can be fully recorded.

  The dead man is lying on his back. His eyes are open. His pants are gathered around his ankles, but he is still wearing his underwear. The knuckles of his hands are bright red with blood, as are the bottoms of his palms, and his knees and calves. His jacket is unzipped, and he’s missing one shoe and one sock. All around him, the snow is pink.

  “Holy crap,” the captain says. He kneels down and snaps on a pair of rubber gloves that he takes from his pocket. He examines the body up close.

  I hear two more sets of footsteps, and another man steps into the pool of light, escorted by a uniformed officer. The uniformed officer takes one look at the dead guy, goes totally pale, and throws up. “Jesus H.,” the other man says.

  “Hey, Chief,” the captain replies.

  “Suicide or homicide?”

  “I don’t know yet. Sexual assault seems like a given, though.”

  “Rich, the guy’s covered in blood from head to toe and he’s lying here in his tighty whites. You think he got sexually assaulted and then committed hara-kiri?” The police chief snorts. “I know I don’t have the vast detective experience you do after fifteen years on the job in the metropolis of Townsend but—”

  I look down at the list in my notebook. What would Dr. Henry Lee do? Well, he’d examine the wounds up close. He’d analyze why there was only superficial blood—that pink transfer on the snow, without any dripping or spatter. He’d note the footprints in the snow—one set that matches the lone sneaker on the victim’s foot, and the other set that has been matched to the jogger who found the body. He’d ask why, after a sexual assault, the victim would still be wearing his underwear if other items of clothing were still removed.

  I am so cold I’m shaking. I stomp my frozen feet in their sneakers. Then I look down at the ground, and suddenly everything’s crystal clear.

  “Actually,” I say, stepping out of my hiding place, “you’re both wrong.”

  Rich

  I don’t know why I kid myself into thinking that I’ll get anything done on the weekends. I have the best intentions, but something always gets in the way. Today, for example, I was determined to build an ice rink in the backyard for Sasha, my seven-year-old. She lives with my ex, Hannah, but she’s with me from Friday night to Sunday, and she is currently planning on joining the U.S. Figure Skating team (if she doesn’t become a singing veterinarian). I figured she’d get a kick out of helping me flood the tarp I set up in the back, bordered by two-by-fours that I hammered into place all week long after work, just to get ready. I promised her that when she woke up on Sunday morning, she’d be able to skate.

  What
I hadn’t counted on was the fact that it would be so freaking cold outside. Sasha started to whine as soon as the wind picked up, so I nixed the plan and drove her to dinner in Burlington instead—she’s a big fan of one place, where you can draw on the tablecloths. She falls asleep on the car ride home while I am still singing along to Hannah Montana songs on her CD, and I carry her upstairs to her bedroom. It’s a haven of pink in a bachelor pad. During the settlement, I got the house, but Hannah got nearly everything inside it. It’s weird to pick Sasha up from her other home and see her new stepdad sprawled on my old couch.

  She stirs a little while I get her undressed and into her nightgown, but then she sighs and curls on her side beneath the covers. For a minute, I just stare at her. Most of the time, being the only detective in a one-horse town is a losing battle. I get paid crap; I investigate cases that are too dull to even make the police log in the local paper. But I’m making sure that Sasha’s world, or at least this tiny corner of it, is a little bit safer.

  It keeps me going.

  Well … that and my twenty-year retirement bonus.

  Downstairs, I grab a flashlight and head out to the aborted ice rink. I turn on the hose. If I stay up for a few more hours, maybe there will be enough water in the tarp to freeze overnight.

  I don’t like breaking promises; I leave that to my ex.

  I’m not a bitter guy; I’m not. It’s just that, in my profession, it’s a lot easier to see actions as either right or wrong, without shades of explanation between them. I didn’t really need to know how Hannah realized her soul mate was not the guy she’d married but instead the one who serviced the coffee machines in the teachers’ room. “He started bringing hazelnut for me,” she said, and somehow I was supposed to be able to understand that meant I don’t love you anymore.

  Back inside, I open the fridge and grab a bottle of Sam Adams. I settle down on the couch, turn on a Bruins game on NESN, and pick up the newspaper. Although most guys turn to the stocks or sports page, I always go for the entertainment section, because of the column in the back. I’m hooked on an agony aunt—that’s the old-fashioned term for an advice column. She calls herself Auntie Em, and she’s my guilty pleasure.

  I’ve fallen in love with my best friend, and I know I’ll never be with him … so how do I get over him?

  My partner just walked out and left me with a four-month-old baby. Help!

  Can you be depressed if you’re only fourteen?

  There are two things I like about this column: that the letters are a constant reminder my life doesn’t suck as much as someone else’s, and that there is at least one person on this planet who seems to have all the answers. Auntie Em is forever coming up with the most practical solutions, as if the key to the great riddles of existence involves surgically cutting away the emotional component and looking at just the facts.

  She’s probably eighty years old and living with a horde of cats, but I kind of think Auntie Em would make a great cop.

  The last letter takes me by surprise.

  I’m married to a great guy, but I can’t stop thinking about my ex, and wondering if I made a mistake. Should I tell him?

  My eyes widen, and I can’t keep myself from checking the byline. The letter writer doesn’t live in Strafford, like Hannah, but instead hails from Stowe. Get a grip, Rich, I tell myself silently.

  I reach for the beer bottle, and I’m just about to take that first indescribable sip when my cell phone rings. “Matson,” I answer.

  “Captain? Sorry to bug you on your night off …”

  It’s Joey Urqhart, a rookie patrolman. I’m sure it’s my imagination, but the new officers get younger every year; this one’s probably still wearing a Pull-Up at night. No doubt, he’s calling to ask me where we keep the extra Kleenex down at the station or something equally inane. The new kids know better than to bother the chief, and I’m the second in command.

  “… it’s just that we got a report of a dead body and I figured you’d want to know.”

  Immediately, I’m on alert. I know better than to ask him questions—like if there are signs of foul play, or if we’re talking suicide. I’ll figure that out myself.

  “Where?”

  He gives me the address of a state highway, near a stretch of conservation land. It’s a popular place for cross-country skiers and snowshoers this time of year. “I’m on my way,” I say, and I hang up.

  I take one last, longing look at the beer I didn’t drink and spill it down the drain. Then I grab Sasha’s coat from the front hallway and rummage through the mudroom for her boots. They’re not there; they’re not on the floor of her bedroom, either. I sit down on the edge of her bed and gently shake her out of sleep. “Hey, baby,” I whisper. “Daddy’s got to go to work.”

  She blinks up at me. “It’s the middle of the night.”

  Technically, it’s only 9:30 P.M., but time is relative when you’re seven years old. “I know. I’m going to take you over to Mrs. Whitbury’s.”

  Mrs. Whitbury probably has a first name, but I haven’t ever used it. She lives across the street and is the widow of a guy who’d been on the job for thirty-five years, so she understands that emergencies happen. She babysat Sasha back when Hannah and I were together, and nowadays when Sasha is staying with me and I get an unexpected call.

  “Mrs. Whitbury smells like feet.”

  She does, actually. “Come on, Sash. I need you to get moving.” She sits up, yawning, as I pull on her coat, tie her fleece hat under her chin. “Where are your boots?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well, they’re not downstairs. You’d better find them, because I can’t.”

  She smirks. “Wow, and you’re a detective?”

  “Thanks for the vote of confidence.” I lift her into my arms. “Wear your slippers,” I say. “I’ll carry you to the car.”

  I buckle her into her car seat even though we’re only going twenty yards, and that’s when I see them—the boots, lying on the rubber mats in the backseat. She must have kicked them off on the way home from Hanover, and I didn’t notice, since I’d carried her into the house.

  If only all mysteries were that easy to solve.

  Mrs. Whitbury opens the door as if she’s been expecting us. “I’m so sorry to bother you,” I begin, but she waves me off.

  “Not at all,” she says. “I was just hoping for a little company anyway. Sasha, I can’t remember, are you a fan of chocolate ice cream or cookie dough?”

  I set Sasha down inside the threshold. “Thanks,” I mouth to Mrs. Whitbury, and I turn to leave, already mentally mapping out the fastest route to the crime scene.

  “Daddy!”

  I turn back to find Sasha with her arms outstretched.

  For a long time after the divorce, Sasha couldn’t stand to have anyone leave her. We came up with a ritual that somehow, along the way, turned into a good-luck charm. “Kiss, hug, high five,” I say, kneeling down and putting the motions to the words. Then we press our thumbs together. “Bag of peanuts.”

  Sasha leans her forehead against mine. “Don’t worry,” we say in unison.

  She waves to me as Mrs. Whitbury closes the door.

  I stick a magnetic light on top of my car and drive twenty miles over the speed limit before realizing that the dead guy won’t be getting any deader if I’m five minutes late, and that there’s black ice all over the roads.

  Which reminds me.

  I never turned off the hose, and by the time I get home, Sasha’s rink might well have spread to the entirety of my back lawn.

  Dear Auntie Em, I think.

  I had to second-mortgage my house to pay my water bill. What should I do?

  Troubled in Townsend

  Dear Troubled,

  Drink less.

  I’m still smiling when I pull up to the spot where police tape is marking a crime scene. Urqhart meets me as I am checking out the abandoned vehicle, a Pontiac. I brush off a bit of snow from the window and peer inside with a flashl
ight to see a backseat full of empty gin bottles.

  “Captain. Sorry to call you in,” he says.

  “What have you got?”

  “A jogger found a body in the woods. Guy’s half naked and there’s blood all over him.”

  I start to follow him along a marked trail. “Who the hell goes jogging at night in the dead of winter?”

  The victim is half dressed and frozen. His pants are pooled around his ankles. I do a quick canvass of the other officers to see what evidence they’ve found—which is minimal. Except for all the blood on the man’s extremities, there’s no hint of an altercation. There are footprints that match the victim’s one remaining sneaker, and another set that apparently were made by the jogger (whose alibi already eliminated him as a suspect)—but the perp either brushed his own footprints away or flew in for the kill. I crouch down and am examining the crosshatch abrasions on the victim’s lower left palm when the chief arrives. “Jesus H.,” he says. “Suicide or homicide?”

  I’m not sure. If it’s homicide, where are the signs of a struggle? Or the defense wounds on the hands? It’s almost as if the skin’s been rubbed off raw instead of scratched, and there’s no trauma to the forearms. If it’s suicide, why is the guy in his underwear, and how did he kill himself? The blood is on his knuckles and knees, not his wrists. The truth is, we just don’t see this often enough in Townsend, Vermont, to make a quick judgment call.

  “I don’t know yet,” I hedge. “Sexual assault seems like a given, though.”

  Suddenly a teenager steps out of the edge of the woods. “Actually, you’re both wrong,” he says.

  “Who the hell are you?” the chief asks, and two of the patrolmen take a step forward to flank the boy.

  “Not you again,” Urqhart says. “He showed up at a robbery about a month ago. He’s some kind of crime scene groupie. Get lost, kid. You don’t belong here.”