The One Where Veronica and the Gang go to Wichita

The One Where Veronica and the Gang go to Wichita

“What’s the name of the band?”
“John Hancock’s Quill.”
“Doesn’t sound very punk to me,” Veronica said.
“Sounds pornographic to me,” Alison said. Everything sounded pornographic to her.
Seth’s truck rattled down the road. Veronica sat in the middle. Alison had the window seat.
“They are punk, therefore cool. It’ll be a good show.”
“Sounds that they should sing Broadway melodies.”
“Punk, show tunes: either way, it’ll be a good show.”
That was debatable. Seth’s definition of a good show was any club that let them in. Only the most desperate of clubs with the most desperate of acts let in the under aged. Still, Seth was starving for live performances of the musical nature and it was a Saturday night out doing something.
Veronica’s parents believed her to be spending the night at Alison’s. Alison conversely told her parents she was staying with Veronica. It was the perfect cover, as both parents were too afraid of the other to call or check up on their daughters.
Wichita was a two and a half hour drive away. Alison brought provisions. Alison’s idea of provision was a case of Dr. Pepper, a bag of chips, and candy bars. They dined like royalty.
Seth didn’t exactly know where the club was. They drove around the Westport section of the city. Veronica folded her arms and concentrated on not complaining that they did not have a map. Finally, in desperation, Alison rolled down the window and yelled out, “Hey! Does anyone know where the Slaughter House is?”
True to its name, the Slaughter House was in fact, a retired slaughter house.
“Is it me, or does this stink like pig intestines?” Veronica asked.
“It’s you,” Alison said. “Now don’t be square or we won’t get in.” The Slaughter House was fairly popular and a line of hopefuls waiting to get in milled in front of the bouncer. Alison was stunning in white hot pants and knee high vinyl white boots. She looked so punk and cool that if she did not get in the Slaughter House, it would loose cool points.
Veronica was wearing what she thought was risqué: a large shirt that hung off on shoulder and a mini skirt so mini, she kept involuntarily tugging it back down. She was wearing the biggest gold earrings she could find and the loudest lipstick Covergirl made.
The bouncer nodded at Alison and said, “You and your friends.”
Inside the club was loud and crowded. Mostly it was loud. Seth grabbed her hand as he made a beeline for the stage.
“Is that the band?” Veronica asked.
“What?” Seth shouted.
“Is that the band!” Veronica shouted about the music.
“Yeah, I know,” Seth said. Great. Clubs were the best places to hold conversations.
Two beers later, Seth had pushed her onto the dance floor. It was crowded and various elbows jabbed.
Breathless, Veronica made her way to the edge of the dance floor. She couldn’t spot Seth, nor Alison.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the distinctive white vinyl boots in the dark of the club. They disappeared out the front door. Veronica followed.
Outside, the air was refreshing smoke free. Her eyes teared up briefly, washing away the pollution of the club from her vision.
She saw a flash of white vinyl and the back of Alison’s head disappear around the corner. She wasn’t alone.
Veronica turned around. Fantastic. They couldn’t go anywhere without someone getting in Alison’s pants. Fucking fantastic. She didn’t know where Seth went and Alison was off to have anonymous sex with a stranger. She was alone, outside the club, not sure what to do next. Maybe she should go in there and find someone, anyone and…She wasn’t sure what would happen next. Didn’t matter, really. Veronica knew she didn’t have the nerve to go find a stranger and fuck them. She wasn’t that kind of girl, unfortunately.
Veronica went back to the door. A small crowd was outside, some waiting for entry, others puffing furiously on cigarettes or waiting for the payphone.
The thick man at the door lowered a thick arm and said, “Sorry, no reentry.”
“Come on, my friends are in there.”
“No reentry.”
“I just came out for some air.”
“No reentry without the hand stamp.”
Veronica looked down at her hand, pure and stamp-free.
“Please, my boyfriend’s inside.”
“No reentry with the stamp.”
“We know the band.”
“No reentry with the stamp.”
“You keep saying that. Surely,” she swallowed her breath and tried her best to be mesmerizing. “Surely there must we some way we can come to an understanding?”
“No reentry.”
“Nothing I can do to change your mind?”
The bouncer looked her up and down slowly. He said, “No reentry with the stamp.”
Veronica rolled her eyes. It was official now, she was completely unattractive and would remain a virgin until the very, bitter, bitter end of her life.
“Let the kid in,” someone from the crowd shouted.
“No.”
“Come on…”
“She don’t even look old enough,” the bouncer said.
“You let me and my friend in earlier. We were old enough then.”
“Yeah,” the bouncer said, “but your friend is fine.”
The unnamed benefactor pushed his way to the front of the crowd. “I saw her inside. She’s cool.”
The bouncer nodded and motioned for Veronica to hurry back into the club. She tried to look over the crowd and spot her benefactor. The crowd was a sea of black leather, much like the crowd inside. No one stood out obviously in shinning armor.
The club seemed to be more crowded now. Veronica stood on her tip-toes and tried to spot the pale blonde head of Seth in the dim light. No such luck.
“So you know the band, huh?” The voice of her benefactor came from behind her.
“No,” she said, turning around. “I was desperate. I thought I’d give it a shot.”
Her benefactor was a thin man of an indeterminate age which could have been anything from fifteen to twenty five. He didn’t look old enough to be in the club. Neither did Veronica. He was wearing a filthy tee shirt which, in a former life, was white, and a black leather jacket. The lighting gave his hair a purple hue. Charming.
“Simon,” he said, shoving a head forward.
“Veronica,” she said, shaking it gingerly, as if he carried germs.
“Any sign of them?”
“How?”
“The people you’re itching to find?”
“I can’t see anything in here. My boyfriend really wanted to see this band and now he’s vanished.”
“Big fan, is he?”
“I believe he said, ‘It’s punk so it’s cool.’ I guess you could say he’s a fan.”
“And you?”
“A bit loud for me.”
“Me, too. Beer?”
Veronica nodded. They went to the bar and clinked bottles.
“You do know someone in the band now. Find your mates and come on backstage.”
“Cool.”
Veronica’s first stop was the bathroom. How very practical of her but three beers and a lot of bouncing around on the dance floor made some things very necessary. There was no line which was nice but the floor was filthy. Graffiti covered the walls. Nice. A genuinely punk place. Veronica chose the least filthy toilet.
Someone entered the bathroom. Through the grab between the stall walls, Veronica could see the clean shine of white vinyl boots.
Someone else entered the bathroom.
“Why did you have to invite her?”
Veronica was ready to flush but stopped at the sound of a familiar voice.
“Because she’s my fucking girlfriend.” Another familiar voice answered.
Through the gap between the metal stale walls, Veronica could see the thinnest sliver of Alison and Seth.
“No, she’s not your fucking girlfriend.”
What an odd to word to emphasize.
“Don’t be like that.”
“I thought you wanted to have fun.”
“We are having fun.”
“This is not what I call fun. Jesus, Seth, just pick one of us and let it be done. I’m not going to fucking wait around forever.”
The bathroom door opened and closed. From her thin vantage, Veronica could see Seth wash his hands in the sink. He splashed cold water on his face before leaving.

***
“How did that make you feel, hearing them talk?”
“Angry. Stunned. Angry.”
“Angry enough to kill?”
“Oh god, no. Just, stunned, like I just found out the great wizard was a snake oil salesman hiding behind a curtain.”
“Betrayed?”
“Don’t go putting words in my mouth.”
“But you were betrayed. They betrayed you.”
“They did not.”
“They were having an affair. Your boyfriend and your best friend.”
“An affair? I think that’s glamorizing the situation. They fucked.”
“You discover a week before her murder that your best friend was fucking your boyfriend. Don’t you think the timing’s odd?”
“Convenient for sloppy police work, you mean?”
“A month before, sure, I could understand that you decided to be the better person, but a week…That’s hardly anytime at all. That’s like making up your mind and waiting for an opportunity.”
“You think I waited for an ice storm? That was my opportunity?”
“It’s great cover. Anything can happen in a storm.”
“Not that.”
“But you were angry?”
“Of course I was angry! The man I loved was fucking my best friend! I don’t know how long it’s been going on? As long as I’ve been dating Seth? As long as I’ve known Seth? How long have they been lying to me? Smiling with their deceitful mouths.”
“Sounds like you put some thought into the matter.”
“What would you do if your wife was screwing your friend?”
“Me? I’d kill one of them. How about you? Ever feel like that?”
“Is this the interrogation technique they teach you at the academy? I haven’t told you a damn thing I didn’t want to tell you.”
“We’re only just starting.”

***
Veronica sat on the toilet and let herself panic for two minutes. Damn. She should have known. There were clues. There were clues, weren’t there? Finding Alison in the library, that was clue. “What are you doing here?” Veronica asked innocently. “Seth told me about this place,” Alison answered, deceitful with her mouth filled with lies and malice. At the time Veronica thought Alison was meeting someone in the library but she assumed that was because Alison was running out of secret rendezvous points in the tiny town.
Calmly Veronica left the stall and went to the sink. The counter was filthy and great gouges in the porcelain littered the sink basin. She turned on the tap and splashed her face with cold water.
“You can do this,” she said to her reflection. “You just have to make it back home.”
Her reflection seemed uncertain.
“Once we’re home, then we’ll worry about what to do.”
The reflection looked sad. She practiced smiling. No luck. Too much teeth, it was faked and look weird. Maybe she should just pretend she had too much to drink. It wouldn’t be so hard. There was plenty of spilled beer on her shirt. She smelled like she was wasted.
Veronica practiced a droopy eyes look and knitted her brows together, as if trying to remember the very most important thing in the world.
Perfect.
Seth and Alison were standing at a table to the right of the stage. The band was disassembling their instruments and the crowd left the dance floor. The table’s top was littered with empty beer bottles. Alison was smoking a cigarette in a bored manner.
“Hey,” Seth said, smiling in her direction. “Where were you?”
“I’ve been looking for you,” Veronica said.
“I went out to get cigarettes.”
“Both of you?”
Seth tossed a worried look at Alison. “No, just me.”
“While you were gone, I met a member of the band.”
“No way,” Seth said. “Which one?”
“The dude with the purple hair.”
“Awesome.” Seth put an arm around her shoulder in a gesture that was possessive and friendly, maker her as his but ambiguous in the extent that he possessed her. “The crowds dieing down. How about we head on back?”
“Sounds good.”

The One Where Veronica Doesn't Get a Good Night's Sleep

Veronica sat up in bed, unsure what woke her. Shackleton had stretched himself out across her feet. His head and tail draped off either end of the bed.
Groggily, she leaned in towards the alarm clock. One in the morning. There was no reason to be awake. Go back to sleep. Pulling covers back to her nose, she realized what had woken her: the total absence of sound. The heater was chugging away, rattling the vents and there was no wind. Perfectly quiet.
The only way out of bed when it was this cold to do it fast. Veronica whipped the covers back quickly and her bare feet landed on the cold wooden floor. She shuffled to the window.
The inside of the glass fogged and vanished and fogged again as her breath hit the panes. Not cold enough for frost but cold enough.
Outside was a figure of a woman, sitting on the lawn. A black dog sat protectively next to her. She was wearing a sweater but no real coat and had a notebook of some sort opened on her lap. The woman’s curly head of bowed over the notebook.
“Christ,” Veronica muttered. She slipped on a warm, fleecy robe and shoved her feet into shoes as fast a possible.
Down the stairs and out the door. No need to be quiet when Cheryl was outside on the lawn.
Crossing the living room, Veronica could see the front door was opened. The air was bitterly cold. She paused to grab the dusty green and tan afghan from the back of the rocking chair.
Shackleton jumped to his feet excitedly as Veronica made it to the porch. Cheryl did not seem to notice.
“Mom?” Veronica asked softly.
No response.
Veronica crouched down next to Cheryl and placed the afghan around her shoulders. “What are you doing out here?”
Cheryl raised her head. Her eyes where vacant and pupils tiny pin pricks. This couldn’t be good. “What,” she murmured.
“What are you doing outside? It’s freezing.”
Cheryl patted Veronica’s hand affectionately. “You’re such a good girl.”
“Let’s go inside.”
“I wanted to draw the house at night.”
“Okay. How about going inside.”
Cheryl slowly rose to her feet but was very intent on explaining her artistic vision. “At night, there’s solitude and peace and this other quality. The way the light, the moon, you know. It’s unsettling. Sometimes, if I’m in the kitchen by myself I think I can hear it. Makes my hair stand on end.”
“Okay. Let’s go inside now.”
“Do you ever feel that way?”
“What way, Mom?”
“Like you’re late to the scene of a crime and no one wants to explain what happened, so you have to figure it out.”
“Everyone feels that way sometimes,” Veronica said.
“No they don’t!”
“Mom, please.”
“Don’t patronize me.” Cheryl struggled out of Veronica’s grip and grabbed the notebook away from her. “Listen to me. I’m trying to tell you something important.”
“Fine. What, what do you need to tell me?”
Cheryl’s shoulder shagged. “I can’t remember.”
Veronica steered Cheryl back inside and onto the coach. Cheryl landed there in a crumpled heap. Patiently, Veronica took the notebook out of her hands and placed it on the carpet. Next, she took Cheryl’s feet and put them up on the coach. Finally, she covered Cheryl with a quilt.
Cheryl’s voice was small. “Why is it you act more like the mom than I do?”
“Because I have to.”
“There’s something bad inside this house.”
“I know about the ghost in the china cabinet. You got another Virgin Mary statue and that will keep him pacified.”
“Not that. The ghost’s isn’t malicious but there’s something in here that wants to hurt you. That’s why the dog was sent here to protect you.”
“Who told you that?”
“Shackleton. He likes the name, by the way.”
“Go to sleep, Mom.” Veronica kissed the top her head quickly.
“Good night dear. Take my notebook. Don’t let anyone find it.”
Veronica picked up the notebook and returned to bed. In the morning she was going to have to tell her father what happened: that Cheryl had another episode and that the dog was talking to her. Maybe she’d have another stay at a hospital, maybe more pills to take. Veronica was too tired to think about tomorrow.

The next morning Cheryl was gone.

“And that didn’t strike you as unusual?”
“No. Mom left lots of times. Sometimes to the hospital, but you saw that coming because of an incident. The crisis. Sometimes she went to stay with Aunt Jackie in Denver, resting.”
“And how did the family take that? Cheryl being away so often?”
“You got use to it. No one said anything. I mean, I had to make dinner and do housework while Mom was away but otherwise we never talked about it.”
“How about your father?”
“He seemed to be in a better mood.”
“Did they ever fight before one of Cheryl’s rests?”
“Sometimes.”
“Sometimes, how?”
“I don’t know. You just get use to life being a certain way and you don’t question it. Mom went away periodically and came back better.”
“You like bug words.”
“I like to read.”
“Why do you feel the need to show off your vocabulary?”
“It’s not showing off. I use the word that seems to fit the situation best.”
“How long was Cheryl gone for?”
“Two weeks. She came back sometime on Christmas Eve.”

Christmas morning, Veronica stumbled bleary eyed downstairs. It was fifty thirty in the morning, too early, even if it was Christmas. Kath couldn’t wait, jumping on the Veronica’s bed in anticipation, begging Veronica to wake. Christian tried to put on a cool demeanor but he was clearly excited. Shackleton caught the excitement and ran in tight circles in the room but not barking. He was sharp like that.
Cheryl was sitting besides the tree, wrapped in a robe and wearing thick plaid slippers, as if she had been there all night.
No one asked where she had been or when she got back. Kath and Christian took their stockings and dumped the contents on the floor.
Cheryl caught Veronica’s eye and smiled. “Merry Christmas, sweetie.”

“Did you know the girl?”
“What girl?”
“The blonde one in the snow. Did you know her?”
“No, I didn’t.”
“Strange, as small as town as Sun City is. Could there be someone you didn’t know? You pride yourself on knowing everyone.”
“Maybe she’s not from around here.”
“Not from around here. Right. A stranger drives into the middle of absolutely nothing to stop in your driveway and ask your father questions.”
“It could happen.”
“You didn’t know her then, but do you know her now?”
“Yes, I know of her.”
“Tragic what happen to that girl. Why don’t you explain to me what happen for those two weeks while your mother was missing.”
“She wasn’t missing. She was in the hospital.”
“Did Keith say that? Did he drive ten hours through the night and arrive safe and sound back at home in time for breakfast?”
“He didn’t say that.”
“He didn’t’ say anything. And there’s no record at Osawatomie of your mother checking in for treatment. No one knows where she was. She was missing.”
“Aunt Jackie’s?”
“No. What happened while she was missing?”

The One Where Veronica Breaks into a Library

The One Where Veronica Breaks into a Library

“Where are we going?” Veronica asked, shutting the front door behind her.
“It’s a surprise,” Seth said.
“What kind of surprise?”
“Pretty good, I think.”
“So not dinner with your parents?”
“Why would that be a surprise?”
“Your mom could make tuna surprise?”
Seth made a face. “Are we out of sight of your house yet?”
“Sounds exciting.” Veronica looked over her shoulder. The house was about a thousand yards away. There were no street lights. “We’re good,” she said.
“Excellent.” Seth grabbed her hand and pulled her off the gravel road into the tall grass.
“What are you doing?”
“It’s a short cut.”
“My shoes will get muddy.”
“Since when have you been a girl who cared about getting her shoes dirty?” True enough.
Seth pulled Veronica through the tall grass. The field was long but shallow, only a half acre across. The far side of the field was the sin side of Constitution Avenue: bar, hotel, and post office.
The night air was cold. Veronica felt the blood drain away from her face and fingers, chilling the flesh. There were no clouds. The stars punctured the velvety night sky with brief glimpses of ancient light.
Behind the post office but not yet out of the field, Seth stopped. “Okay,” he said, putting a hand in a back pocket. “Put this on.” He handed her a red bandana.
“Are you serious?”
“Never more. Put it on.”
“No.”
“Come on. I want you to be totally surprised.” The way he spoke, the words and their accompanying emotions rolled across his face like dark clouds rolling across a sunny sky.
“Fine.” She tied on the bandana.
“Is it tight?”
“Tight enough.”
“No peaking.”
A large, warm hand clasped hers and cautiously pulled her forward. The bandana smelled of Seth’s hair products.
They walked forward another twenty steps. Veronica counted. He halted. Veronica bumped into him. “Careful,” he said quietly.
“Why are we whispering?”
“Because what we are about to do is frowned upon in the state of Kansas.”
Veronica felt an involuntary, electric thrill surge up her body.
There was the sound of wood scrapping against wood and then a window being opened.
“Okay, take a step up on the box.” His hands guided her feet. Everywhere flesh touched, she felt involuntary excitement and ache.
“Okay, now I need you to crawl in through here.”
“This would be easier if I wasn’t blindfolded.”
“Tough.”
Veronica put her hands forward and felt a rough edge of wood, a window sill littered with peeling paint. She lifted one leg and pulled herself through. On the other side of the window was a large, flat surface. She slid across and sat on the edge, legs dangling impatiently.
“Can I take it off now?”
“No.”
“Why not.”
“Can’t you just wait?”
“No. Come on. Hurry up.”
Lips pressed against hers, quick and clumsy in the dark. “Hold your horses,” he said.
Fine. It was very cold and felt colder than the outside, as if she was waiting impatiently in a large meat locker.
“Doesn’t this place have heat?”
“Um, not really.”
The sound of something else being hauled in through the window.
“Okay. Ready?”
“Oh yeah.” She removed the blindfold.
The room was cold and seemed cavernous in the faint light provided by the lantern. Even through Veronica had not set foot in this building in five years, she knew it immediately.
“The library,” she said quietly. To say it too loudly would be inviting fortune to take the library away again. It was a magical place that existed on the past and somehow she was in its foreign country and the no one had been alerted to her presence.
The Sun City library was boarded up five years ago due to a shrinking tax base. Not enough money for books and librarians.
One table was pushed against the wall, under the window she had crawled through. On the table rested a cooler, a blanket, a lantern, and Seth’s guitar case.
She approached the shelves slowly, as if stalking a prey that might scatter if they saw her. The books were on the shelves, neatly arranged and waiting, as if there had been no end of the world, no library free world outside.
The entire library felt that way. The chairs were pushed under tables. Veronica ran her finger along the backs of the chair, dragging a trail through thick dust. Heavy velvet curtains drawn against the boarded windows. In the middle of the room was a circular desk. Cards were still in drawers. Stamps rested atop dried ink pads. Pens were in a cup and bookmarks were stacked neatly in a little pile. The air about the place was that it was waiting to open for business in the morning, not as if it had been abandoned.
“This is amazing.”
“So how long will it take you to read everything in here?”
Veronica couldn’t find the words so she threw herself at Seth, wrapping her arms around him in a fierce embrace.
“A month? Two months? Tell me it’ll keep you busy until the summer?”
“It’s wonderful! This is the best gift anyone could give anyone ever!”
“That might be over doing it.”
“It’s the perfect gift for me.”
He kissed her. It curled her toes. One time. Her body was aching for sex, crying out in a primordial way that kept her up at night. His hand pressed against her lower back, holding her against him. This was it. She could feel undeniable momentum and knew there was only one destination. Finally.
One time couldn’t hurt, if they were careful. Just like that, Veronica’s convictions to remain a virgin and not get knocked up were compromised with a single thought.
Seth pulled away. Veronica stood there dumbly, her mouth working like a fish gasping air. “Don’t you want to know what’s in the cooler?” he asked.
Derailed. Again. Damn it. Why bother to bring her to a dark, secluded library with a blanket and every opportunity of getting lucky if he was only going to talk about what was in the cooler.
“What’s in the cooler?” she asked, trying not to let disappointment and frustration color the tone of her voice.
“A feast. A movable feast, if you will.” He smiled like the sun breaking out from behind clouds. His gazed fixed on hers. Disappointment vanished. She couldn’t stay mad him, not when his gaze made her felt like the center of the universe, as if she were the sun and not the other way around.
From the cooler emerge a feast of cold fried chicken and cans of beer. A blanket was spread across the floor in true picnic fashion. The lantern flicked across the dusty spines of books, casting shadows on the ceiling. It was perfect.
“So how did you find this place?” Veronica cracked the lid of the can.
“It’s the library,” Seth said in a tone of voice that implied her question was silly.
“I mean, how did you find a way to get in? How did you know the books were just left here?”
“I didn’t. In the midst of petty vandalism and general no-goodery, I noticed the plywood over the window was loose.”
“So naturally, you crawled in through the window.”
“Naturally.”
“Thank you.”
Seth smiled like the clouds rolling across the face of the sun, casting shadows on the prairie. He said, “What are you going to read first?”
“Steinbeck.”
“All this effort for Steinbeck? He’s in the school library.”
“Just The Grapes of Wrath. He wrote more than one book and I plan on reading them.”
“After Steinbeck?”
“Don’t know. I think I’m might start with that shelf over there and work my way across.”
“Why not just start with the letter A?”
“Libraries aren’t arranged that way. Haven’t you ever heard of Dewey decimal?”
“Nope. This is the most time I’ve ever been in a…library, did you call it?”
Veronica threw the empty beer can at his head. He ducked the missile neatly. “I hope you don’t plan on littering,” he said.
She shook her head. She wouldn’t’ dream of littering in this, the most sacred of places.
Seth removed the guitar from the case. “I’ve been working on this, so tell me what you think…”