Chapter 7

On the morning of the interview I woke up the with a sense of dread. I had a bad feeling about the dirty blond TV reporter. I expected the worst possible scenario to come to pass. I had no idea what that might be at the time, but it did come to pass as I expected. What I expected was for her to somehow be equipped with our worst closet skeletons. You know just to make the interview more news worthy. Alison had volunteered to sell the fake novel story during the interview. We all had agreed to allow her to answer any questions about the novel and it’s part of our investigation.

The message on my phone when I lifted it off the charging station was from Alison. “Sorry Ed, I don’t feel up to the walk this morning. I will be at the interview, so don’t worry.” Which of course guaranteed that I would worry.

I left the building through a side door, since I didn’t have to meet Alison for the Urban Hike. I decided that since I had a meeting about the car wash after the TV interview, I would take the residential tour. With that route, I could get one more look at the car wash before I signed off on the deal.

If possible the car wash looked worse that morning. The tufts of uncut grass accentuated the poor condition of the pavement. The brickwork was dirty and the small amount of trim hadn’t been painted in what looked like ten years. Then two of the four freestanding concrete islands, used for the vacuum machines, were crumbling. The roof was held up by metal trusses, which were badly in need of painting.

Even with all it’s defects, there were things I liked about it. For one thing it was located in a residential area inside the largest of the three merged towns. Which meant it was within a few miles of everything I needed. The area was both quiet and at the same time just a few hundred yards from the major intersection of two well traveled road. It was also near shopping areas. The downside of the project was that it was a car wash.

After my somewhat detailed examination of the car wash, I officially made the decision to buy the sucker, if the price were close to what Tom and I agreed was fair. I would know soon enough, since the meeting with Louise’s Realtor was less than four hours in the future.

I made it back the The Haven in time for a shower, then a bowl of my own raisin bran cereal. The off the shelf raisin bran cereal contained raisins that were so old and dried out that they were the consistency of pea sized river pebbles. They were the kind favored by landscapers. To eliminate that, I bought bran flakes with no raisins. Then bought a box of name brand raisins. Yes it was a pain in the ass some mornings, but if you had to eat that crap, which I did, it was the only way to go.

After my breakfast it was ten twenty, so I sat by the window looking out over the parking lot and at my covered three wheeled scooter stashed in the far corner. As I always did looking through those windows, I was reminded of the renovations done to the old building. The ones minimally necessary to make it suitable for us old farts. The triple glazed plastic framed windows were one of those. The windows did not leak air at all.

My particular apartment had a heated apartment on either side, as well as one above and below. With those windows as well, living there was a lot like living in a mason jar with the lid screwed on tightly. Believe it or not, I missed drafts. After those thoughts, it was time to head off to the 11AM interview.

I planned to be the first one there, however The Judge won that honor. “Been here long?” I asked him?

“Just got here,” he replied avoiding my eyes. The Judge was wearing his sailing outfit. It was his blue blazer and white ascot. I would have laughed any other time, but it seemed to be right outfit for the silly ass bullshit interview. Next came Alison, she was still ten minutes early for the interview’s scheduled time. Finally the TV crew arrived with Louise in tow. So much for the mystery of the leak in our group, I thought.

The dishwater blond didn’t look nearly as young and fresh as I had expected from Alison’s description. She was at least thirty based on my daughter’s age and physique. Her blond hair was not as washed out as I expected and not nearly as unkempt. So I was forced to admit my mental description was way the fuck off.

We all shook hands and traded names. The camera man’s name sounded a little like Girble, so of course that is how I thought or him. The girl was Helen Adair, no doubt her stage name. That was the total crew.

The interview began with Helen giving her background, then getting right into it. Even though Helen went right for The Judge, he slipped the explanation of how we met back the Alison. She explained the Book club. She moved onto my daughter having stumbled across a murder victim in the Emergency room. Murder was so rare in this little town, that we decided to write our own novel. It was inspired by ‘The Murder Of Eve’ our working title,” Alison explained. Then Alison went on to explain how we researched our fictional Eve’s fictional murder.

“I’ve done some research myself,” Helen stated strongly. “It seems the information in your draft version of the ‘Eve tale’ is very similar to the real murder.”

My mouth fell open. From my expression I was the only one caught by surprise. The book shit was suppose to be pure fantasy, but this woman had read a non existent draft copy. That did not make me a happy camper at all.

“So chief, did you shepherd the investigation?” Helen asked.

“No of course not. I just gave a few words of advice as we went along. The Judge here gets most of the credit,” I suggested. I wanted to get out from under the bus wheels as much and soon as possible. The other three basked in the warmth of Helen’s praise. I fumed at the betrayal of my former friends. No wonder they always steered clear of me except for our dinner, and the meetings afterward. I was about ready to walk out of the interview when Helen broached the final question, which was also the straw likely to break my family’s back.