Disorderly Conduct. Mary Feliz
family in line.
I heard a scuffle on the kitchen tiles, looked up, and burst out laughing. All three of our animals, Belle, our boisterous golden retriever, and Holmes and Watson, our marmalade-colored cats, assisted Max as he loaded their food, travel dishes, water, and kitty litter into a plastic bin. Watson’s head was buried in a bag of cat kibble, while Belle nudged Max’s arm with her snout. She knocked Max’s steady hands out of alignment as he poured dog chow from a ten-pound bag into a one-gallon screw-top container. Dried nuggets skittered across the floor. Belle scrambled to help by gobbling up each morsel as quickly as possible. Holmes, Watson’s more reserved brother, batted at a tidbit that had bounced to a stop at his feet.
“When you’re done with that, hon, can you help the boys gather up the electronics? It’s too soon to put them in the cars, but I’d like them all down here charging up and ready to go.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Max said, saluting without looking up from his task.
“Too many orders? Too bossy?” Under stress, I tended to bark out instructions without thinking about how they might be received by the folks around me—even the people I loved the most.
My phone rang, saving Max from responding. I pulled it from my pocket and glanced at the screen as I answered. “Hey, Tess,” I said. “We’re nearly there. Did Patrick show up?”
The day before, Tess had told me that Patrick hadn’t responded to her phone calls. She’d wanted to let him know we might be camping out at their house for a few days to get out of the path of the potential firestorm. She’d speculated that he’d gone on an extended run or become caught up in a project at work. A devoted engineer, he often vanished into the thicket of a thorny technical problem and lost track of time, especially on weekends. But Patrick had been out of touch longer than usual, and I knew Tess was worried.
“That’s just it.” Tess’s voice caught, and I could hear her take a deep breath.
“What’s wrong? What’s happened? Do you want us to make alternative plans? If it’s not convenient—”
“No. No. No. It’s not that. It’s...”
“It’s what? You’re scaring me. Spill.”
“It’s Patrick. The police think they’ve found him.”
“The police?” The words I was using and the strained tone of my voice must have worried Max. He looked up and furrowed his brow.
“Does she need help?” he asked. “Take off if you need to. The boys and I can finish up and meet you in half an hour.”
I flapped my hand at Max, urging him to stop talking so I could hear Tess, who was, uncharacteristically, having trouble completing a sentence. She sighed.
“Oh, Maggie. The sheriff’s office just called. Around dawn this morning, they found a man up off the old Pacific Gas and Electric maintenance road. It looks like he fell. Patrick runs there all the time. They...they think it’s Patrick.”
“Is he hurt? Where is he now? Do you need a ride to the hospital? Is he conscious? Why don’t they just ask him who he is?”
“He’s dead.” Tess’s voice broke with a sob. “I mean, the guy they found is dead. It’s not Patrick, but they think it’s him.”
I couldn’t think of a thing to say, and Tess didn’t give me time.
“Can you get down here, Maggie? Can Max and the boys stay with Teddy? They want me to identify the body, and...” Tess coughed and soldiered on. “I mean, they want me to confirm that it’s not my Patrick so they can figure out who he really is, poor guy.” Tess struggled to get her voice, tears, and breathing under control. In her grief, she sounded as if she’d just finished a marathon. Breathless and exhausted.
“Of course. Whatever you need. We’ll be right—”
Tess didn’t let me finish. “I don’t think I can drive safely, Maggie. It’s in Santa Clara. The medical examiner’s office.” She sniffed. “This is so stupid. I keep bursting into tears. But it’s ridiculous. Of course it’s not Patrick. He’s at work. Only he’s not answering his phone. The battery is dead, I’m sure. You know how he is.”
I did know Patrick. Keeping his phone charged wasn’t high on his priority list. But my skin rippled with goose bumps and I shivered. Whatever we discovered at the medical examiner’s office, I suspected the lives of Tess and her son, Teddy, would never be the same again.
Chapter 2
Emergency plans should include provisions for your pets and for anyone in the family such as infants, small children, the elderly or those with special needs who might need extra help or individualized supplies.
From the Notebook of Maggie McDonald
Simplicity Itself Organizing Services
Sunday, August 6, Morning
I’d driven as quickly as I could to Tess’s house, a typical Northern California ranch-style tract home built in the early 1960s, down the street from the local middle school. I parked in the driveway and took a moment to collect myself. I’d dashed out of the house so fast that I hadn’t taken the time to consider my outfit. Were the jeans, T-shirt, and clog sneakers I’d thrown on at dawn appropriate for meeting with a county official? Looking in the rearview mirror, I finger-combed my hair and plucked a cobweb from my shoulder. It would have to do.
I walked through the side gate and into the backyard, where a well-appointed covered deck served as an outdoor entertainment area in all but the worst winter storms. Tess’s kitchen door was always open to friends of the Olmos family. I opened the door without knocking, entered the kitchen, and smiled at Teddy, who sat cross-legged on the checkerboard-patterned tile floor, hugging Mozart, a German shepherd with a perpetually puzzled expression.
Mozart looked up and wagged his tail, but stuck close to Teddy. I wasn’t sure what to say to a fourteen-year-old who was waiting to learn if his father had perished. I didn’t know what Tess had already told him.
“Hey, Teddy,” I said.
Tess, with high heels clicking, burst into the room, saving me from finding words appropriate to the situation.
“Is this stupid? This is stupid. No one gets dressed up to visit the medical examiner.” She tugged on her black suit jacket and straightened her already perfectly aligned skirt. I had a hunch she’d chosen her outfit to boost her confidence. Her fashion sense had two modes. At home, she was schlumpy Tess in sweats and Uggs. At work, in the rocket-fast, megabucks world of Silicon Valley real estate, she was a fashionista in designer shoes and suits, with her velvet-black hair confined in a neatly pinned French twist.
In her kick-back clothing, Tess was my best pal. Dressed up, she was scary, and I referred to her not-so-secretly as “the dominatrix.” The Tess who stood before me now was terrified and had donned the suit as armor to help her face today’s horrifying news. I pulled her into a reassuring hug. Whether the gesture was for her comfort or my own, I wasn’t certain.
“Don’t you dare say anything nice,” Tess said. She returned my embrace, then gently pushed me away. “If you do, I’ll fall apart.”
Teddy cleared his throat and spoke in a voice an octave lower than his normal boyish alto. “I want to go with you.” I turned from Tess to Teddy. Teddy still had his arm wrapped around Mozart, who nudged the chin of his boy with his snout. The young teen’s eyes filled with tears. I couldn’t say whether his wish to accompany Tess was that of a nearly grown man desperate to protect a loved one, or that of a young boy looking for comfort from his mother. I suspected Teddy wasn’t sure either.
Tess shook her head, took a deep breath, and knelt by Teddy’s side. Instead of the hug I’d expected, she leaned into him, mirroring the posture of the German shepherd on her son’s right. It was a portrait of love, made irresistible by the befuddled look on Mozart’s face created by the combination of his tilted head and one-up, one-down ears. Nobody spoke. At least