Page 17 of Happy After All

“Why do you think that?”

“They’re old ladies,” I say.

“Why would you think a person would get less dangerous with time? It seems to me that their life experience and the willingness of others to underestimate them only makes them more dangerous.”

I can’t dispute that.

He picks up the washers and angles his head around behind the washing machine. “For God’s sake.”

“What?”

“She just popped the closest bolts and washers off and loosened a hose, which is where the water is coming from. But she didn’t use her hands. She had to get tools.”

My mouth drops open.

“What a fraud,” I say. “She plays so innocent ...”

“I’m telling you. It’s the experience that makes them deadly.”

“And I really do mean that you don’t need to fix this.”

“I’ve got it,” he says.

“Do you need tools?”

“That would help.”

I have a whole tool kit, in fact. I haven’t used it, but I got it in case it might be useful. All I wanted when I bought this place was to be as self-sufficient as possible. Though I’m comfortable now with the fact that calling a repairman is its own kind of self-sufficiency. Just like hiring Elise was its own form of self-sufficiency. Freeing certain aspects of my life up so that I can do more than just live behind the desk at the motel.

That’s when I realize what Nathan said is true. Elise working at the front desk sabotaged Wilma and Lydia because they were hoping it would make sense to get me over here at the same time Nathan was here, right as they made a disaster.

I’m going to have to have words with them.

I run to the motel office, where the tool kit is in the closet behind the desk. Elise sees me coming toward her, and I look right past her over to where Wilma and Lydia are huddled up in the corner. “You poor little dears,” I say. “Don’t know how to run a washing machine. So wise in your old age and can’t figure out that you shouldn’t go pulling hardware out of it.”

They both tut and flutter and act as if I’m casting aspersions unfairly. Elise looks over at me, her ponytail swinging wildly with the motion. “What?”

“They are meddling in my life,” I say.

“It’s justlightmeddling,” Lydia says.

“What does that mean?” I ask.

“It means,” Wilma says, straightening her shoulders indignantly, “that nothing we’re doing would have any effect if there wasn’t a little bit of electricity between you and the handsome man.”

“Oh, there’s electricity all right,” I say. “The kind that’s liable to electrocute us both.”

“The best kind,” Wilma says, absolutely glowing in delight.

I move behind the counter and open the closet, starting my hunt for the toolbox.

“I’m going to need the whole story later,” Elise says.

“I plan on giving it to you, but you might have to provide me with an alibi.”

“As nefarious plots go,” Elise says, “this one is fairly harmless.”

“Unless I die of embarrassment,” I say.

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