Page 31 of Passerby: A Psychological Thriller
After their departure, I spend a good part of the day helping Julia clean and overturn the rooms for the guests who are set to check in this afternoon. Roy’s partner removed Danny Vera’s belongings from his room. She spent a good hour in there, doing I’m not sure what. Obviously she was searching for something, a suicide note possibly, or some other clue as to what might have happened. Otherwise healthy twenty- somethings rarely drop dead without warning. All I know is we are fully booked tonight, which means the opportunity to sit around and ponder the situation is short-lived. There are things that have to be done, and it’s just me and Julia to handle them.
Johnny’s busy with the fire department.
Davis is busy with Ashley.
Ashley’s busy with… well, that’s a good question.
I’m busy trying to keep us in business.
I haul the trash from the kitchen out to the large bins we store behind the workshop, and as I head back to the house to finish folding the last of the linens, I’m making a mental list of what’s left to do. As I round the corner to the front of the house, I stop in my tracks. I am not expecting to see the squad car in the drive or Roy standing next to Davis’s truck inspecting the tires. “Can I help you?”
“Ah, Ruth,” he says, bending upward from the waist. “I was hoping you might be around.”
When am I not? The words almost roll right off my tongue. I bite them back because it’s none of his business. This, and he keeps asking me for a date.
“We’re booked,” I say. “Tonight. And there’s still lots to do yet…” I am hoping that he’ll take the hint. I don’t have time to hang around making small talk.
Roy places his hands on his hips. “Aren’t you always?”
“What?”
“Aren’t you usually booked solid?”
“This time of year, yes. But with everything this morning—well, I got a late start on turning the rooms over. And now you’re back.” My response comes out harshly, but I can’t help it. I’m annoyed that I have to repeat myself, plus there’s the overwhelm. All it takes is one or two negative reviews and business can dry up like that. I’ve seen it happen. Hospitality is a precarious industry, and attention to detail is important. There’s no half-assing cleanliness. Still, he doesn’t take the hint.
He passive aggressively refuses to get to the point and let me get on with my day. Of course he does. In this town, he has nothing better to do, and his uniform makes people feel obligated to entertain his whims.
This is why I change course. I subtly remind him that there are things to do other than to hang around my place, groveling for a date he’ll never get. I am not, nor have I ever been, attracted to Roy. “How’s Gabby Jenkins?”
Roy knows exactly why I’m asking about Gabby. He’s a cop through and through, which means he’s aware I’m fishing for info on her father. Not that I care what Roy thinks. I’m not trying to hide it. I’m trying to kill two birds with one stone. “She’s…um…you know… She’s recovering.”
“That’s good.”
He looks me dead in the eye. “He cheated on you, Ruth. Ages ago. And here you are, still moping around, pining over him.”
“No, I’m not. I’m working.”
“Do you think Ryan Jenkins is concerned about you? Has he ever once called? Has he ever once shown interest? In all these years?”
I don’t answer his line of questioning. I know good and well when to keep my mouth shut, but yes, Ryan Jenkins did call me once. The night before he got married. Sure, he was drunk. But he called. He said a lot of things that showed concern. But mostly, he wanted to know if I could forgive him.
Supposedly, what happened was a one-time thing. A one-time thing that resulted in a pregnancy. I’ll never know whether or not that’s true, I only know it doesn’t really matter. What happened happened, whether he messed up one time or twenty.
He ended up with a wife and a daughter.
Either way, I could have forgiven him. Or at least I think I could’ve. Maybe I should have told him as much. But I was bitter, and more than that, I was embarrassed. Heck, some would argue I’m still bitter. We were supposed to go to college together, to come back to Jester Falls afterward, get married and raise a family. Ryan hit the fast forward button on life, and he did it with someone else. But even that’s not why I lied.
I lied because I thought he’d keep trying. I didn’t know that if I told him I couldn’t—in any way, shape, or form—get past what he’d done, that he’d go ahead with the wedding. I was young and immature. It was a long time ago, back when I thought that if you loved something, that if you loved someone, you fought for them. Maybe there’s a part of me that still thinks that, and maybe that is the part of me that is asking Roy how Ryan is, without actually asking. Maybe, I’ve come to realize, it’s better to have a thing than not.
“Anyway,” Roy tells me with a disappointed sigh. “I’m here about what happened at the Holts’ place the night before last.”
“And what’s that?”
“Come on, Ruthie. Don’t play dumb with me.” He shifts his weight from one foot to the other. “You’re a lot of things, but we both know you’re not that.”
“Don’t call me Ruthie. We’re not kids anymore.”
“No, we aren’t.”