Chapter 13
Okay, no big deal.
I desecrated the body.
I’ll just undesecrate it real fast before anybody notices.
I’m about to stealthily retrieve my phone when Louis barks again, a man steps into my periphery, and I panic, doing the first
thing I can think of, a thing that makes perfect sense in the moment: I throw myself over Cran, grieving mobster-widow style,
and fake a sob.
It makes a lot less sense in the moment afterward, but it’s too late. I’ve committed to this, now I have to see it through.
“Are you okay?” the man asks tentatively.
My face is pressed into a dead man.
I am definitely not okay.
“It was just so sudden,” I mumble into Cran’s chest, subtly trying to feel around for the phone without this guy catching
on. “Er . . . could you find me a tissue?”
The guy hesitates and then says, “I’ll be right back.”
While he steps away, I quickly get more aggressive in my search—when my hand hits something hard, I instinctively pull it out, even though I almost immediately realize it’s the wrong size and shape (a matchbook—did it fall out of his coat pocket?), but I don’t stop to put it back, I thrust my hand farther in until I feel the familiar edge of my phone. I yank it up just in the nick of time.
I will be sterilizing this hunk of metal the second I get back home.
Also showering for an hour.
And no more playing in coffins.
“Here you go,” the guy says, returning.
“Thanks a ton,” I say, sniffling into the tissue. “I’m Mo.”
“Hi, Mo,” he says with a nod.
Unlike the rest of the room, this guy actually seems a little sad. He’s easily got a foot and a half on me, and his overgrown
dark hair makes him look even sadder. In one hand, he’s holding half a turkey sandwich from the refreshments table, and I
prepare to forcibly hold Jean back from eating it, but for once, he doesn’t seem interested.
Instead, the massive poodle is leaning against the back of my legs. I silently pray that Leslie’s purse dog didn’t make him
sick—one thing this funeral clearly doesn’t need is dog barf everywhere to really drive home the futility of life.
The guy reaches out for a handshake. “I’m Tond.”
“Nice to meet you, Todd,” I say.
“Tond,” he corrects me, like everyone has heard of that very common name. “How did you know Cran?”
Since I deployed the crying-in-the-coffin strategy to cover my grope for the phone, I’m sort of stuck with that vibe. “How
did I know him?” I echo, running my finger along the edge of the casket and thinking fast. “I was his girlfriend.”
He frowns. “You don’t look like a model.”
“Um, wow.”
He frowns harder, studying me too close. “No, I mean—Cran said you were a model and I just thought models were . . . taller.”
“Right, no, I was his other girlfriend. His secret girlfriend. That he was ashamed of.” Nope, too far. I try to laugh casually. “And how did you know him?”
“He was my brother,” Tond says.
“YES!” I say, before I catch myself and quickly follow up by leaning in and touching his cheek tenderly as though I’m overcome.
“Yes, I can see the resemblance, how remarkable.”
They look nothing alike.
I may have overplayed my hand.
“So great to finally meet you, Tond. And sorry about your brother.” I shake my head sadly. “Who was also my secret boyfriend.”
“I . . . didn’t know about you,” Tond says awkwardly.
“It was new,” I say, and then quickly add, “but meaningful.”
“Meaningful?” Tond says, his voice bitter. “That’s a first.”
Interesting. Some bad blood between siblings?
“You know how it is.” I sigh, trying to get misty-eyed as I rack my brains for the remnants of high school Latin. What was
that thing about love conquering all? “Semper fi, as they say.”
“Are you in the marines?” he asks, taking a dainty bite of sandwich.
Oh nuts. Nope, that’s a bumper sticker I saw last week.
I need to get this back on track. “So, anyway, the last thing Cran said to me was that if anything happened to him, he wanted you to have the poodles. I’m sure they’ll
bring you a lot of comfort,” I say, holding out the leashes.
Tond is now straight-up bewildered. And not as grateful as I would have thought. “He wanted me to have his poodles?”
“They’ve been very sweet and no trouble at all,” I lie. I force the leashes into his non-sandwich hand.
“Oh, that’s okay,” Tond says uncomfortably, like they’re dirty underwear or something. “You’re the meaningful secret girlfriend, you can take them.” He stuffs the leashes back in my hand.
“I insist—” I say, trying to hot potato the leashes back to him.
“It’s fine—” he says, pushing them back at me.
We both let go and the leashes drop down to the plush red carpet between us.
Stalemate it is.
I could run. If I run, Tond will have to take the dogs.
Unless, of course, the dogs think we’re playing a game and they chase me out of the funeral home and back into the car, in which
case I’ve just made it all worse.
No, I need to stand firm. I need to DWHWD (Do What Hannah Would Do), which is to say: This is a moment for UPGRADE. I need
the A for Act Confident. Because whether I walk or run or crawl out of here, I am not doing it with these dogs.
I can’t wait to tell Han about this application of UPGRADE.
Or some of it, anyway. The part that doesn’t make me sound like a maniac. Does any part of this funeral tableau not make me
sound like a maniac?
Eh. I can retcon it later.
“Tond, I’m gonna level with you. These dogs need a stable home. The kind of home you can provide. They shouldn’t be with me.
Look at me. I’m a secret girlfriend that Cran wouldn’t tell his own brother about. The cops want to arrest me for having these dogs.”
That last part definitely might be true.
And I finally have his attention. “The cops are involved?” he whispers.
Bingo. Time to think fast. And think good.
“Oh yeah. The cops? Involved? Majorly. There’s this big-time cop who just got transferred into town, right after a breakup, just him and his, um, houseplant, and he has a real chip on his shoulder about all of it.
Oh, and his partner? Phew, his partner just wants to see some action.
” Tond looks positively green at all this, and that means .
. . he doesn’t recognize that I’m ripping off the plot of Hot Fuzz, the last cop movie I saw.
Unfortunately, I have just exhausted my memory of that movie because I fell asleep on Chris’s couch while we were watching
it.
Ugh, Chris’s couch.
Ugh, Chris is waiting outside, gotta move things along.
“Anyway, this lady Claudia was the one who called them because she just loooooves the cops, so she made sure they were looking into
everything, and I mean everything, Tond, including me and my possession of these dogs, so now the uh, big-time cop-slash-detective is fully up my butt about this case, and plus on top of all that, you know, poodles are sensitive, they really struggle with strangers.”
I only stop because I have completely run out of breath.
Tond blinks. Like about a hundred times. “I just . . . need a minute,” he says, pale under the dark mop of bangs.
“No problemo,” I say as he glances toward the refreshments table. Probably needs a glass of water. Or whiskey. I know how
jarring it can be to suddenly become a dog parent.
I, meanwhile, am ecstatic. I am killing this UPGRADE! Hannah would be so proud! I Acted Confident. I Didn’t Doubt! I’m already
at E for Execute! Let’s doooo this!!!
I pick up the leashes, deposit them in Tond’s hand, manually fold his fingers around them, and give him a quick wink. “I’ll
just run to the ladies’ room so you guys can get reacquainted.”
In the bathroom, I do a little victory dance in front of the full-length mirror, feeling light for the first time in days.
Then I pull out my phone to text Claudia. She won’t be happy but at least this way I don’t have to tell her to her face.
Me: Well I tried but dogs didn’t sniff out a murderer
Me: So I gave the dogs to Cran’s brother who was moved to tears by my generous gesture
I pause for a second, finger hovering over the send arrow. But I really need to be firm here. Crystal clear with no room for
argument.
Me: You and Benny do what you want but I really can’t be involved anymore
I put my phone on silent and tuck it in my bag. I’ll deal with the repercussions later. Right now—time to get out of here.
But there, standing in the hallway, is Mr. Eternal Rest, frowning severely and holding the leashes of all three dogs.
I think I audibly whimper, but I’m in kind of a fugue state so it’s hard to say.
He holds the leashes out to me gingerly, like he’s holding the tail of a dead rat. “Mr. Johnston told me to wait here for
you. He said you’d be leaving with these creatures.”
“No!” I say, then compose myself. “I’m sorry, you’re mistaken, those are Mr. Johnston’s dogs now.” I try to skirt past him,
but he’s quicker than he looks. He blocks the way so I have no choice.
After I finally take the leashes, he looks at his hands with revulsion. “I’m going to go wash up, and when I return, all four of you had better be gone from my establishment.”
I nod meekly. “My apologies for disturbing everyone.”
He nods, then disappears to the men’s bathroom, at which point I race back into the funeral room.
Thankfully, Tond is tall, and I spot the back of his head across the room, sticking up from the crowd.
I push my way through, elbowing cranky real estate agents and landscapers and contractors to get through as fast as possible.
I’m almost to Tond when Jean tugs at his leash, trying to crawl through a pair of legs to get to something.
I can just make out the giant red bag and a tiny pair of feet beneath it, which means he’s in the mood for another of Leslie’s purse dogs, and who can blame him—but this is no time for a nosh.
“Jean!” I whisper sharply, and he turns to look at me, irritated. “Later.”
He seems to accept this, but unfortunately, the brief detour took us off course, and a woman with an impressive set of biceps
steps between Tond’s back and me, yammering on her cell phone and not looking where she’s going. She wedges me against the
wall with her solid and immovable shoulders.