Standing outside the trailer park brought back many memories, most of them uncomfortable. I took a deep breath, glad I’d escaped years ago. I hadn’t been home since my mother died twenty years ago. I only revisited my Ohio hometown for funerals. Funerals and a favor.
In my slacks and a light jacket, I’d come a long way from the bib overalls and bare feet of my youth. I didn’t hate Bidderville, but I’d left town when I turned eighteen. The town hadn’t changed in the thirty years since I’d left. The trailer park where my aunt lived looked as it had when I’d been a child, complete with tattered American flags and faded whirligigs in yards marked by plastic picket fences.
I touched the baggie in my pocket, the thing that had brought me back. Jimmy was dead. Nothing would bring him back, but I needed answers, or I’d have no peace.
Aunt Phaedra’s trailer was where I’d left it. The ‘Fortune Teller’ sign outside the doorway looked more faded, but a new one reading ‘$10.00’ had been added by someone using finger paints.
I climbed the steps and knocked on the aluminum door, smiling as to why a fortune teller would need to be told someone was at the door.
“Just a minute,” Aunt Phaedra called.
Rustling noises came from the other side of the door. The old woman was probably putting on her wig. I couldn’t believe she was still alive. She’d been my mother’s aunt. That would make her my great-aunt. No spring chicken myself, I was still calculating the old woman’s age when the door opened.
A short woman in a silver wig peered at me. She’d been a heavy woman when I’d done chores for her as a teen, but now she was enormous. As wide as the door, rolls of fat obscured her chin and pressed against the orange muumuu’s seams. She was so wizened her wrinkles had wrinkles.
“Who are you?” she asked.
“I’m Alex Poe, Stella’s boy.”
“Stella’s dead. Her husband, too.” She closed one eye as if that would improve her memory. “Alex Poe? The writer?”
“Yes.” I pointed at the sign. “Are you still in business?”
She frowned. “I charge the same for family. Come in.”
I followed her inside. The dark interior smelled of cloves and peppermint. Flickering candles, faded photographs, and dusty knickknacks covered every surface. Heavy draperies and aluminum foil blocked the few windows.
I stopped at a round table with a crystal ball. “That’s new.”
Aunt Phaedra snorted. “The rubes expect a little mumbo jumbo for ten bucks.”
She lowered herself into an overstuffed chair and scratched the scalp beneath her wig. “Alex? Weren’t you the weird kid who collected mushrooms?”
I smiled. “It was cheaper than buying poison for the barn rats.”
“So, you’re a big writer now. I read a couple of your spy novels. Not enough sex.” Aunt Phaedra looked me up and down. “You don’t look like a rich writer.”
“I’m no Stephen King or Barbara Cartland, but I get by.”
“Yeah, me, too. Did you bring what I need?” She pointed toward a shelf lined with spice jars containing gray powder. That shelf had scared me when I was younger.
Aunt Phaedra possessed second sight. She predicted the future and found lost items for people. My mother swore Aunt Phaedra’s saliva had cured her ringworm when she was younger. As a child, I’d lived in fear of catching something that required an old woman to spit on me as part of the cure.
I took the plastic bag from my pocket and placed it on the table. The ashes inside gave no indication of the person it had been. “How much?”
She laid her hand on a deck of well-worn Canasta cards. “It’s a hundred and a game of Canasta. Since you’re a celebrity, I’ll make it fifty and two games.”
I pulled out my wallet and placed the money on the table. I should’ve remembered her love of cards. Nobody would play with her because she almost always won.
“So, did some old man take the safe combination with him when he died?” she asked. “He hid the winning lottery ticket somewhere? Is his will missing?”
I took the battered deck of Canasta cards and shuffled them. “Nothing that complicated, Auntie. I need to know if this man’s wife killed him.”
“It’s never that easy,” she said. “Fifteen cards, two Canastas.”
I hadn’t played Canasta for years and appreciated her reminding me of the two player rules. I’d never been very good, and Aunt Phaedra beat me the first game. She attracted wild cards like suckers looking for lottery numbers. For a large woman, she had delicate fingers, and the worn cards flew across the table as she dealt.
The smell of spices and scented candles grew stronger the longer we played, and the macabre spice rack kept drawing my eyes.
The second game went better. The fates sent a few wild cards my way, and Aunt Phaedra chatted. “So, I heard your old man married a woman back East after your ma died.”
“Yeah.” I drew two cards. “He died about five years ago in New Jersey.”
“So why are you back in Ohio?” She’d already laid one natural Canasta down. Massive points.
“Classmate’s funeral. Died in his sleep and asked to be buried here.”
She nodded. “Kind of young, wasn’t he?”
“Middle age is rough.” I laid down an unnatural Canasta. “He’d been ill.”
“Old age is worse.” She picked up the pile. “Don’t end up here, rotting away in the Pine Meadows Trailer Park.”
“Is that a prophecy? Do you need ten more dollars?” I laid down my second Canasta. “I’m out.”
She looked surprised. “Not bad. No, you’ll know when I predict something. One more game.”
“Maybe after you answer my question.”
She picked up the plastic bag and an empty spice bottle that might have once contained garlic powder or paprika. I hoped she’d washed it.
She poured the contents of the baggie into the jar but didn’t put the lid on. Instead, she licked her forefinger and stuck it into the ashes.
I grimaced. “Can you see who killed him?”
She stuck Jimmy’s cremated remains in her mouth and closed her eyes. She sat for a moment before opening them wide. She jerked and trembled, and I feared she’d had a seizure. With a whimper, she slid from her chair and onto the floor.
“Auntie!” I jumped up and knelt beside her.
She pushed me away. “What the hell was that?”
“I don’t know. Does that happen every time?”
“No. I’ve never felt pain like that before. Every muscle in my body is cramping.”
I helped her up and waited while she adjusted her wig.
“Did you experience his death?” I asked.
“No. The end is usually more peaceful than that. This guy lived in a lot of pain. What did he have? Cancer?”
I sat. “Worse. Something called Multiple System Atrophy. It’s like Parkinson’s without any treatment. His nerves disintegrated. He would have been bedridden and helpless if he’d lived much longer.”
“So much pain.” Aunt Phaedra put the lid on the bottle of ashes. “Are you sure he didn’t kill himself? I would have—” She stopped in mid-sentence and grabbed my hand. “He loved you!”
I nodded. “He was my best friend growing up. He made me get out of this dump and make something of myself. Bidderville was no place for someone like me.”
“You should have told me. Didn’t you read the sign?”
I looked above the row of ashes. An old yellow sign read: NO COPS, NO TERMINAL PATIENTS, NO ReFUNDS.
She rubbed her temples. “You could have told me he hurt so much.”
“I didn’t know. He didn’t tell me when I saw him last. He might’ve lived ten more years, but he was already using two canes. Did you see anything about his wife?”
Aunt Phaedra patted her ample bosom. “I was too busy trying not to have a stroke. Maybe more will come back later. That happens sometimes.”
I didn’t like the sound of that. “Could you try another taste?”
“No. I’d get the same vision if I got anything at all.” She looked at the bottle still in her hand. “Why do you think his wife did it?”
“I don’t, but his family didn’t like him dying so soon. The doctors, when they learned he had MSA, didn’t do an autopsy. They figured if he died in his sleep, it was a blessing.”
She picked up the cards and dealt them.
“Why no cops?” I asked. “My friend’s death might have been investigated by the police.”
“There’s no real connection between the customer and the dead with cops.” She picked up her cards. “Unlike you and your friend.”
“I don’t imagine the court would take your testimony anyway,” I said. “There’d be no evidence.”
“Yes. I’m the last resort for desperate people.” Her tone held a tone of suspicion, but she didn’t look up from her cards.
Damn. No wild cards this time. To win and get out of here, I needed to concentrate. I had the answer I needed.
“Two red capsules,” she said.
My heart stopped. “What?”
She laid down a Canasta. “I also saw two red pills. The gelatin kind you put something in and slide together. And a note.”
My heart hammered back to life. “A note? What did it say?”
“Nothing. There was a little drawing of a raven or a crow. Mean anything to you?”
“No. It’s your turn.” I picked up the discard pile, a stupid move if I wanted the game to end. Maybe if she caught me with a couple hundred points, the game would be over sooner. Of course, the discard pile included a Canasta. I laid it down.
“How close were the two of you?” she asked. “Does his wife know how much he cared for you?”
“Yes. We’d been friends since second grade. I don’t believe she killed him. I’m checking because the family needs some closure.” My explanation sounded weak even to me.
“Did they contact the police?”
“Yes, but his small pension wasn’t enough of a motive for them.”
Aunt Phaedra drew. “If she killed him, it might have been a mercy killing.”
“Possible, but without evidence, we’ll never know. He left no note, no empty medicine bottles, no sign he knew it was the end.”
She scowled and scratched under her wig. “You’re not here for the family. You wondered if there was a supernatural way of discovering who killed your friend since there was no evidence.”
“No.” I took a card to cover my discomfort. “You’ve been reading too many of my novels.”
She played all her cards. “I’m out.”
It was over. I’d found what I was looking for. “It’s been interesting, Aunt Phaedra. Thanks for the game and for the information on Jimmy. You’re sure you didn’t see anything else?”
“No.” She stacked the cards. “Pain. Red pills. Note. Raven.”
I stood. “Thanks for the reading. You keep the ashes?”
“Yes. My own little memorial to the dear departed. Your friend will be in good company.”
I didn’t need his ashes to remind me of him and the strength of our friendship.
She didn’t stand. “Drop in anytime. You’re not a bad Canasta player.”
If she couldn’t expose me, no one could. “Thanks, Auntie.”
Outside, I breathed in the fresh air. Auntie Phaedra had been correct. I wanted to see if, even without physical evidence, there were ways to discover who had given Jimmy the deadly mushrooms and ended his pain.
I shouldn’t have sketched a raven on the note when I sent him the pills, but my aunt hadn’t connected my surname with Edgar Allen Poe’s famous poem.
What would I have done if she’d seen my involvement in Jimmy’s death? Paid her to keep quiet probably. Maybe I had been looking for absolution, someone to expose me and make me pay for what I’d done.
Instead of feeling the relief I’d expected at Auntie Phaedra’s inability to see the truth, I only experienced an empty chill as I left the trailer park and headed to the cemetery.
—
