Coming Unclued Read online

  Coming Unclued

  Judith Jackson

  CHAPTER 1

  A small grey mouse was sitting on Gran’s Princess Diana, Angel of Hope commemorative plate, its tail flicking contentedly in Di’s halo as he nibbled on a Ritz cracker. I love that plate — one of the few keepsakes of Gran’s I have, since Sharon and my mom carted most of her stuff off to the Sally Ann before her ashes had time to settle in the urn. I squinted at the little guy and he jumped down, scampered across the floor and clambered up the window blind, his tiny feet sending up puffs of dust that hung suspended in the sunlight streaming through the slats. I lay on my side, calmly watching his progress until the picture finally registered through my brain fog. “Jesus! There’s a mouse in my apartment.” I struggled to sit up but my body was resisting. Rebelling actually. I was crunched up on the loveseat in the living room, still wearing the red satin dress that I’d worn to the office Christmas party the night before. It was bunched up around my waist, my Spanx-encased midsection straining to escape. No wonder my stomach ached. I’d probably done permanent damage to some of my vital organs. A faint croak escaped through my crusty mouth as I wrestled my legs onto the floor and struggled to a standing position. I felt dizzy and had a horrible headache. Probably a lack of oxygen from the girdle. It was Sharon’s fault. She’s the one who insisted I needed to wear something so that the loose skin from my recent thirty pound weight loss wasn’t “flapping all over the party.” After a two minute struggle and the release of some pungent underarm odor I managed to peel the Spanx off of my sweaty puckered skin and take a deep breath.

  Watching carefully to make sure the rodent didn’t scuttle across my unprotected toes I grabbed the shoes that were lying under the coffee table and pulled them on while trying to make sense of the two empty wine glasses, a quarter bottle of my favorite Shiraz, and a plate containing the remnants of crackers, Brie and a healthy smattering of mouse shit. Who had I entertained? Angie? She’d dropped by a couple of times for an evening of wine and cheese and griping about the office, but it didn’t seem likely she’d come by after the party. Still, someone had been here, and there wasn’t a more likely candidate. Keeping a wary eye out for rampaging vermin I picked up the phone and hit the second name on my contact list.

  Julie, the best friend a woman could ever have, picked up on the first ring.

  “Hi Val.”

  “Hi. Do you own a mousetrap? I have an infestation.”

  “Probably. I’ll ask Andrew. How was the soiree?”

  “A little hazy, but I must have been enjoying someone’s company because there’s a plate of nibblies sitting on my coffee table.”

  Julie was silent for a moment. “You don’t remember?”

  Oops. Too much honesty.

  “I’m exaggerating. I remember the evening, but I can’t quite recollect who I invited back for a drink. Probably Angie.”

  “Wasn’t the party a dinner? Why were you making snacks after dinner at a steakhouse?” Julie’s voice had a very annoying, accusatory tone to it.

  “That part would fall under the category of can’t quite remember. More importantly, a mouse has shat all over the leftovers. I’m feeling a little rough. If you could find it in yourself to drop by with a trap I’ll put coffee on. And I made banana bread yesterday. The kind with the toasted pecans.”

  More silence.

  “I’ll be there in ten minutes.”

  Well then. Good. My head was throbbing and the contents of my stomach seemed to be curdling, but here I was coping, managing the problem at hand. I was going to deal with the mouse — Julie probably knew how to set a trap — and after some coffee and a few aspirin the previous night’s festivities would probably come into clearer focus. I just needed to get out of the dress and tidy up a little before Julie showed up, looking down her perfectly formed British nose at my situation. Julie was my closest friend, but she had a tendency to be a bit rigid, somewhat Dowager Countess of Grantham-like at times. I wouldn’t be able to spin entertaining an unidentified guest and then passing out on the love seat as an amusing anecdote.

  My bunions were aching. How had I managed to hobble around in these shoes all night? I scanned the room for any signs of a rodent and then kicked the shoes across the floor, tossed back two extra strength aspirin and put the coffee on. The kitchen looked pretty good. There were a few crumbs on the counter and the banana bread I’d baked had a few slices missing, but it was more or less wrapped up. I hadn’t been so intoxicated that I’d neglected to maintain the freshness of my baked goods. I crammed a few dishes in the dishwasher, tossed the Brie wrapper in the garbage and used the back of my hand to flick some scraps into the sink. The coffee table. Better clean that off. I grabbed up the plates and glasses and wiped off the table with a sour smelling dish cloth. There were mouse turds all over the plate. Disgusting. I stacked everything and made a snap decision. It was all going out. There was no way I was ever going to eat off turdy dishes. I unlocked the door and peeked out. No one in the hall to see me so I hustled over to the chute and yanked it open.

  “Val?”

  No one to see me except Heather, my neighbor, coming up the stairs carrying a Starbucks cup and a bouquet of flowers. And looking young — or youngish — and slim, and not the slightest bit winded after climbing the four flights of stairs. Sometimes she was a hard person to like. This morning though, as she leaned against the wall and stared at me there was no denying that she wasn’t looking her usual glowing self. In the bright morning light she looked pretty close to her forty-one years. “What are you doing?” Her voice had a similar tone to Julie’s. Accusatory. A little aggressive.

  “Throwing out some dishes and wine. I know we’re not supposed to just dump stuff like this, but I’m having a rough morning.” I showed her the plate before I tossed it down the chute. “I have mice. There was mouse shit all over it.”

  “What?” Heather curled up her nose in confusion, a look that tended to drive men to distraction, but not something I was in the mood for.

  “A mouse defecated on my dishes. I’m throwing them out. Also my wine. I’m quitting drinking. For real this time.”

  “Oh.”

  She was still gaping at me. “Do you feel all right Val?”

  “I’m fine. Just a little hung over and a lot repulsed. Julie’s bringing over a trap.”

  That was enough to rouse Heather, the lover of all four legged beasts, out of her stupor. “What kind of trap?”

  “The regular kind.”

  “You can get a live trap and release the mouse back into the wild. That would be the humane thing to do.”

  She was so irritating, staring at me like I was an exotic exhibit. Where was her tact? Just because she was incapable of cutting loose and having a good time. “I think I’ll just kill it the regular way. Snap its neck or whatever.”

  Heather shuddered and looked truly shaken. Honestly, she had no sense of proportion. “It’s only a mouse,” I said.

  “Even mice have a right to life Val.”

  Jesus.

  “Is that what you wore to your office party?” She was struggling to fight the disdain in her voice. Now that was the Heather I knew and most of the time quite liked.

  “It looked better before I slept in it, scrunched up on the loveseat. And I was wearing flab control last night.”

  She didn’t look convinced. Actually she looked appalled, perhaps struggling with the concept of going to sleep without cleansing and moisturizing. “You slept on the loveseat? Who slept over?”

  She had such a harsh tone to her voice and I was tiring of my dreary friends’ attitude to what had clearly been a merry night full of joie de vivre. “I slept on the loveseat because I had a tiny bit too much to drink. It was a hell of a party.” That seem
ed highly unlikely but who was she to dispute it? I tossed the wine bottle down the chute. “No more Christmas cheer for me.”

  We stared at each other for a moment and I cracked first.

  “I’m going to go grab a shower.”

  Heather nodded her head. “Remember what I told you about the blow dryer.”

  How could I forget? Heather, who was an esthetician, had kindly told me that to avoid a nasty rash I should lift up all my creases and give them a good blow dry after a shower. I tried to tell myself her advice was well-meaning.

  “Gotta go Heather. Julie will be here any minute. Drop by for some coffee if you want.”

  She held up her cup. “Green tea. Day three of my pre-Christmas cleanse.”

  Another cleanse. No wonder she looked wan. “Okey-Dokey,” I said, heading back into my condo, trying to sound jaunty and carefree; the kind of person who had too many interesting things going on to be fretting about an unflattering dress or a little mould around her midsection.

  “Talk to you later,” called Heather. “I’m happy to hear you had a good time.”

  Oh Heather wasn’t so bad. She had a good heart.

  “Thanks. Come by if you feel like it — I made banana bread. Live a little.”

  Heather would never eat a slice of my delicious, glutenous banana bread even if she wasn’t subsisting on green tea and vegetable broth, but we both liked to maintain the fiction that she was willing to occasionally indulge herself.

  “Very tempting,” said Heather, which was code for “how can you pollute your flabby body with that white flour crap?”

  Back in the kitchen I pulled a big knife out of the rack and cut myself a nice thick slice of the banana bread. Scrumptious. I really was quite a talented baker. If I had a little more gumption and a lot more of a work ethic I could probably be running a successful bakery, the kind where there were line-ups to buy my cleverly named cupcakes, instead of working in a windowless cubicle doing mind-numbing paperwork. But enough of that. I wasn’t going to let my mind wander down that road today. I arranged a few slices on the Frosty the Snowman plate Evan had given me for Christmas when he was five. Perfect. Julie would feel like she’d dropped by for a jolly, festive tea. I pondered whether she should set the trap before or after we ate. Which would be less cheery, a rodent scuttling by while we drank our coffee or trying to chat while listening to the death throes of the mouse if it wasn’t killed instantly? I’d let Julie decide.

  Five minutes to repair the damage from what had clearly been a fun but over-indulgent night. Who’d have thought our normally tedious office party would result in a little after-hours merrymaking? I’d run out of time for a shower, but I could at least throw on some fresh makeup and change out of my dress. My one bedroom plus den (den being real estate speak for a nine by nine closetless alcove) condo had clearly been designed by someone who had never lived in an apartment, with the mirrored vanity outside the tiny bathroom and the walk-in closet in the hall, rather than in the bedroom where it belonged. Admittedly, the layout had proved quite handy over the summer while Evan had been bunking with me between apartments, since he could access the closet to toss in one of his two pairs of jeans without tromping through my bedroom. And the placement of the vanity, odd as it was, at least meant I could brush my teeth or tweeze my brows as needed since it was a little worrisome how much time the boy spent in the bathroom. Evan insists it isn’t the case, but I do wonder if my continually tapping on the door and saying, “What are you doing in there?” might have been the catalyst for his sudden move into his own place.

  I glanced in the mirror over the vanity and took an involuntary step backward when I saw my reflection. No wonder Heather had been so gobsmacked by the sight of me. My hair was sticking out in jell-encrusted chunks, my eyes were sunken pinholes and I had a smear of lipstick on my chin. And Sharon was right; a satin dress really did accentuate my problem areas, which, even with the weight loss, was pretty much my entire torso.

  I smeared Cetaphil over my face, wiped it off and splashed myself with warm water. Better. For a forty-seven year old woman I have remarkably good skin. A few broken blood vessels and a couple of sun spots, but overall pretty damn good. Until quite recently, in a dim light I could have passed for a woman in her late thirties, but lately I seem to have turned a corner. Now, if my age comes up, no one seems at all taken aback that someone as youthful and spritely as me could possibly be in her mid-forties. Nobody bats an eye when I mention that my son, my six-foot-two, twenty-three-year-old son if you can believe that, is in his first year of dental school. Well no one except for Julie. Blanched in horror would be a pretty accurate description of Julie’s reaction to Evan’s chosen career. “How could he?” she asked. “All those horrible mouths and the tarter and the decay. Revolting.” Now granted, Julie is British and some of the teeth are still pretty nasty there, but she pretty much summed up my feelings about my beloved son becoming a dentist. However, I am a good, supportive, non-judgmental mother and I don’t say things like that. Under normal circumstances I don’t say things like that. Evan was over for dinner a few nights ago and I had a couple glasses of wine. Haven’t heard from him since. There is the tiniest, slightest possibility that I may have mentioned my discomfort, my sincere disappointment that my only child, the light of my life who’d always been so artistic, was planning to poke around in people’s festering mouths for a living when he was clearly meant for more creative things. Evan has always been a little sensitive to any perceived criticism.

  I quickly brushed my cheeks with blush and put on a little mascara. Only a slight improvement. Starting tomorrow I was going to eat right and exercise and of course not drink a drop of alcohol. And sleep eight hours on a satin pillow which was supposed to be good at preventing wrinkles. Maybe after Christmas, when I needed to flush out a little intestinal debris, I’d even try one of Heather’s cleanses. I’d be back to my old self in no time.

  I slithered out of the satin dress and into a pair of yoga pants that had never seen the inside of a yoga studio and an incredibly soft, pale blue sweater that Heather gave me last Christmas. Cashmere. My first cashmere sweater. I gave her a Luscious Low Fat Recipes cookbook, but since she had upped the present ante I’d have to search farther than the dollar deals page on Amazon for this year’s gift.

  I pulled my shoulder-length brown hair back into a ponytail, gave my cheeks a quick pinch — one of Gran’s favorite beauty tips — and peered in the mirror. Not great, but passable enough to keep Julie’s interrogation to a minimum. A quick pee and a swig of mouthwash and I’d be good to go. I hustled into the bathroom, put the toilet seat down and tried to avoid looking up. One of the other design flaws of my condo was the decision to put a mirrored shower stall directly across from the toilet. Naked white thighs splayed across the toilet seat is not a vision that would inspire confidence in even the sturdiest of egos. The toilet. Something was nagging at me. The toilet! I live alone. Evan hadn’t been here for a couple of days. Why was the toilet seat up? Did I drink so much I actually threw up? Didn’t sound like me. I have a strong stomach. So why was the toilet seat up? Had there been a man here last night? A man who couldn’t be bothered to put the toilet seat down while I’m staggering around the kitchen rustling him up a nice snack. I racked my still murky brain to think of a male from the office I could possibly have brought home. Ken? Six feet five inches, about 150 pounds, a bushy mustache and a propensity for dirty jokes involving animals. I could never be that drunk. Not possible. Richard? A kind, annoyingly fastidious, sixty-year-old married man. His desk was decorated with pictures of his large family engaged in what seemed like endless celebrations. It wasn’t Richard.

  The aspirin was starting to work its magic, but I wasn’t feeling much better. How could I have done this again? I don’t even like drinking that much. I can take it or leave it. I’d prefer to take it, but it doesn’t fill me with the kind of orgiastic pleasure that a slab of New York cheesecake does.

  There was a brisk knock on
the door. Julie. She prides herself on her punctuality. Actually she prides herself on a lot of things. Her unshakable confidence is one of her most tiresome qualities. I mentally braced myself and hustled to let her in, a cheerful, no hangover here smile pasted to my face.

  “Your security door is still broken,” said Julie, in lieu of hello. “Don’t your condo fees cover that kind of thing? Who’s on the board?” she demanded. “Give them a call. Any wino or pervert could be wandering the halls.” Julie always has an eye out for the perverts who walk amongst us.

  “I’ll deal with it,” I said. “Go sit down — I’ll get the coffee.”

  I was actually on the condo board, though I’d yet to attend a meeting.

  “Where do you want the trap?” called Julie, as she marched into the living room in her usual purposeful manner. She was wearing sweat pants and a faded yellow hoody. Not nicely fitted yoga pants with a little flared leg. Baggy grey sweat pants, tight against her ankle. Julie didn’t believe in following the vagaries of fashion. If the clothes fit she wore them, and if the clothes didn’t quite fit she wore them anyway. “I can’t do coffee,” she said. “No time. I’ve got to run to the grocery store. I’m just dropping this off.”

  Just as well she couldn’t linger. I didn’t have the energy for it.

  “I’ve smeared it with peanut butter,” she said, carefully setting the trap and placing it against the wall.

  “What if it goes off?” I asked.

  “You remove the dead mouse and toss it in the garbage. And then you reset the trap. There’s never just one. And look — I brought you some of this mouse treat stuff. They eat it and then they go back to their nest and quietly dehydrate or something.”

  “Poison,” I said. “That sounds kind of mean.”

  “As opposed to luring them in with peanut butter and snapping their neck?”

  I nibbled on a piece of banana bread and contemplated my options. There was no way I was picking up a dead mouse. “I’ll use an oven mitt and toss the whole mess down the chute. I’m pretty sure there’s only one. He looked like a loner.”