©2008, James C. Taylor, all rights reserved (but you knew that).

I am not at all satisfied with this piece, but considering the energy it was born from, I felt the need to just get it out of the queue (and my system) and get on with other things. Comments are welcome, as I may redo this to put it together more the way I originally imagined it.

“I don’t pay you to sit in your car and twiddle your thumbs, Gaspard!” Fratelli’s voice sizzled through the cell phone’s speaker.

Dan Gaspard sat back in the seat of his gray Toyota and focused his zoom binoculars at the small crack between the curtains in room 117 of the Baysider Motel, the window still streaked with rain. “Actually, boss, you do.” He saw John Terwilliger sit down with a pint of Chinese and point a remote control.

“Don’t you get fresh with me, Gaspard! Mrs. Terwilliger is paying us for results!”

“I have results. Mr. Terwilliger isn’t doing anything.” Rain started to fall again. He flicked his wiper on for a second.

“He’s at a motel, Gaspard!”

“Watching television.”

“Gaspard, you and I have been in this business long enough to know that you don’t tell your wife you’re working late and then go to a motel to watch television.”

“Well, Mr. Fratelli, unless he’s called the Invisible Hooker Service, he’s in there alone.”

“Then he’s there to meet someone, Gaspard!”

“Unless he’s having an affair with the delivery man from Number One Dragon, he isn’t meeting anyone.”

“There is something going on there, Gaspard, and you’d better find it and find it today. I have to give Mrs. Terwilliger a report tomorrow and I need something better than ‘Your husband is watching television in a motel.’ He’s doing something, Gaspard. Find out what.” Fratelli banged the receiver down.

Dan took a deep breath and looked out at the rain, then shut off the cell phone and reached down for his can of Mountain Dew™. The phone jangled its vibration happy dance in the seat next to him. He activated the hands free. “What, Mary Ann?”

“Didn’t your mama teach you how to answer the phone?”

“My mama never calls me while I’m running surveillance. What do you want?”

“Who were you on the phone with?”

Dan sighed. “My boss. The guy paying me to sit outside the Baysider and run this surveillance.”

“Don’t make him mad, Dan. You need this job.”

Dan closed his eyes and grabbed the bridge of his nose. “Yes. I wouldn’t need it quite so much if you were working too.”

“That’s what I called to tell you about, Dan! I was the last cut for the play!”

“Did you say the last cut?”

“Yeah! I almost got the part!”

“You almost got the part.”

“Yeah. It’s the closest I’ve come to getting a paying part since I was the intergalactic meter maid for that PSA. I’m doing much better at auditions. I’ll be a star in no time.”

“You’ll have a resume full of roles you almost got.”

“You’re not being very supportive.”

“I’m being -Yaaa!” Dan jumped away from his side window, knocking the phone to the floor. Tapping on the window was John Terwilliger. “Excuse me, but why have you been following me?”

Dan slid his hand into his jacket pocket, fishing for his knife. “I’m not following you.”

“Please don’t lie. I know you’ve been following me. It’s okay. In fact, I’m glad. But I need to talk to you about it. Would you come into my room?”

Dan shook his head no.
“Well, may I come into your car.” Terwilliger raised his hands in the air, palms forward. “I’m unarmed. I just want to talk.” Dan stared at him. “It’s raining. Please?”

Dan motioned for Terwilliger to go around to the passenger side and unlocked the door. Terwilliger opened the door and sat down. He was a thin man, and a little soft. His shoulders drooped and his eyes looked as though they had seen a lot and cried a lot.

“My wife thinks I’m having an affair.”

“You’re not?”

“You’ve been watching me. You tell me.”

“You’re not.” Dan shifted in his seat. “So what are you doing?”

“Trying to make my wife think I’m having an affair.”

“You want your wife to think you’re having an affair?”

Terwilliger smiled a thin smile. “Yes.”

The men looked at each other and breathed in silence. Dan searched John Terwilliger’s eyes. “Why?”

“My wife is a battle-axe and a control freak and has forgotten that she ever liked me, never mind why she liked me.”

Dan put a finger to his chin. “So you’re trying to get her to divorce you.”

“No. I’m trying to stay married.”

Dan frowned. Terwilliger’s eyes went to one side, misting over and looking at nothing. “I still remember what I love about her. Apart from the berating me and telling me what to do, my wife is a remarkable woman.”

“So why are you pretending to have an affair?”

Terwilliger looked at Dan. “The only time lately my wife is nice to me, the only time she acts like she wants me around, is when she thinks someone is trying to take me away from her.”

“So what does any of this have to do with me.”

“I need you to tell her I’m having an affair. I can’t go back to the way it was. I just can’t.” Terwilliger patted the side pocket of his coat. “I’ll pay you. I’m worth it. You know I am.”

“Look. I work for Al Fratelli. And he works for your wife. I can’t take your money to lie to her. If you had just had some woman stage it with you, I’d have pictures of you two and your wife could think whatever she’d like.”

“I couldn’t ask any of my co-workers to do that; she knows them. She might go after them.”

“I don’t know what to tell you. Hire a prostitute, I guess.”

Terwilliger wrinkled his nose. “No. And besides that, my wife knows me. She wouldn’t believe that.” Terwilliger breathed in deeply, then exhaled. He looked around the car, then at Dan. “Well, then.” Terwilliger opened the door into the light rain. “Are you sure you won’t reconsider?”

“I can’t, Mr. Terwilliger. You seem like a nice guy and all, but I just can’t.”

Terwilliger stepped out. “I’ll be in 117 for another hour or so if you change your mind.” Terwilliger closed the car door and sprinted through the rain to the motel door. Dan turned on the radio and got out his binoculars.

—§—

“Who is she?” Natalie Terwilliger’s voice bounced off the walls of Al Fratelli’s office. She leaned forward angrily, her fists clenched. Fratelli stood to match her standing, although his slight paunch and five foot eight frame was no match for her five ten (in heels) and her formidable bosom and bulk.

As the two squared off, Dan could see why John Terwilliger might have been attracted to this virago. Natalie Terwilliger still had an hourglass shape, even if the sands overflowed the hourglass. And she was obviously passionate. He imagined make up sex could be potentially fatal.

“We don’t know who she is yet, Mrs. Terwilliger. Please, sit down.”

“Don’t tell me to sit down! My husband is having an affair with some tart and I will not sit down!” And Dan could imagine with that mezzo-soprano cannon going off all the time why Terwilliger would sit in a motel room by himself and watch television. The tendons in her neck were drawn tight. “I paid you to find out who my husband has been spending all his time with and damn it, I want to know who she is!”

“Mrs. Terwilliger, you wanted us to find evidence of your husband cheating. We did that. If you’d like us to continue our surveillance and find out who she is, we’ll do that too.” Dan could almost see the dollar signs in Fratelli’s eyes.

“Of course I want to know who she is! Are all you people idiots?” Even red faced and tensed with anger, her body radiated sex. ‘Like making love to a buzz saw,’ Dan thought, and smiled. “And yes, I’ll pay you to find out something you should have already found out, you morons!”

Natalie Terwilliger threw the folder on the table. “Find out who she is! Now!” Mrs. Terwilliger pivoted on her high heel and stomped out, slamming the door behind her.

Al Fratelli sat down. “Tell me again Gaspard why we don’t know who this woman is.”

“Because she gave me the slip before I found out.” Dan opened his notes, but he told the story without looking at them. “She walked up to the room. She spent maybe five minutes in there, ten tops. She walked back to the street and caught the bus. I followed. She took the bus to the mall. I followed. She went in the ladies’ room but I never saw her come out.”
“She just disappeared.” Fratelli frowned in contempt.

“No. I missed her.” Dan got up from his chair. “I’m might take Mary Ann with me next time and send her in there to watch what the woman is doing and check for a second exit out of the bathroom that I didn’t have covered.” Dan walked to the door. “I’ll find her.”

Dan just wasn’t sure what he’d do when he did.

—§—

“Look, Mary Ann. It’d just be one evening.” Dan watched the motel room window through the lens of his camera. “I need someone to follow this woman if she shows up.”

“I told you before, Dan; I have that play I’m rehearsing for.” Mary Ann’s voice sounded off to Dan, like it did when there was something she was not telling him along with all that she was. But that could have just been all the noise in the background.

“I could really score points with Mr. Fratelli on this, Mary Ann.” John Terwilliger waved at Dan, then drew the blinds. Dan put down his camera.

“Look, Danny, I just can’t tonight. But I’ll make it up to you. I found this gorgeous teddy that fits me perfectly. Usually for someone long-waisted like me they look wrong but this one fits like a dream.”
Dan blinked twice as he watched the Cadillac roll slowly into the parking lot. “Fine, Mary Ann. I have to go anyway; the guy’s wife just pulled up.”

Natalie Terwilliger was leaning behind the wheel, wearing sunglasses and a wide brimmed hat, as if John Terwilliger wouldn’t recognize his buxom wife in the outfit, never mind seeing his wife’s car in the parking lot
Dan got out of his car and walked over to hers.

Natalie unlocked the door to the Cadillac and frantically waved for Dan to get inside. “What do you think you’re doing, Casper? He’s going to see you!”

“It’s Gaspard. And that’s what I came over to tell you.”

“I wanted to see this trollop in person myself.” Natalie spat the words as she said them. Her blouse had a scoop neck which showed a respectable yet tantalizing amount of cleavage and she smelled of a lilac-based perfume.

“She’s not coming.”

Natalie scowled at Dan. “How do you know she’s not coming?”

Dan considered it for a split second, realizing he could not say that John Terwilliger knew Dan was out there and probably knew Natalie was out there and probably had staged the whole thing last time just to keep his cover going. “I don’t, really. Just talking about the luck I’ve had so far with this case.”
“Maybe I’ll bring you better luck.”

“Maybe.” Dan pulled on the handle to open the car door.

“Don’t get out! We can’t risk him seeing you.”

Dan chuckled in his throat. “My camera is in my car.”

“I don’t need you to take pictures. I need to see this woman for myself.”

“Mr. Fratelli won’t like that I didn’t take any pictures.”

“You can tell Mr. Fratelli that I told you not to take any.”

“Mr. Fratelli really won’t like that you’re doing surveillance with me.”

“Fratelli will like whatever I pay him to like.” Natalie closed her eyes and tilted her head back, stretching out the muscles of her neck. “Would you mind rubbing the back of my neck? I have soreness in it and my shoulders.”

“Mrs. Terwilliger, I don’t think that’s appropriate.”

A wave of sadness crossed her face, then left. “Fine. Go get your camera. Never mind. Just stay in your car. I’ll do this--”

The woman got off of the city bus and walked to John Terwilliger’s room. She was about five foot five, yet long in the body. She was wearing a wig of a blue not found in nature, as she had the previous time. She walked with an insouciance that Dan found unnerving for a female who was the other woman.

“Casper, what do we do?” Natalie whispered.

“We wait.”

“For what?”

“For her to come out.”

“Why don’t we just go in and bust them?”

“Bust them? We’re not the police, Mrs. Terwilliger.”

“But we’ll let them know we’re on to them.”

Dan shook his head. “That helps you how? You wanted to know who she is. If we bust in there, she runs away.”

“You could stop her.”

Dan laughed. “And then I’d go to jail for assault or kidnapping or some such.” Dan sighed. “We wait until she comes out and then we follow her.”

“This isn’t how private detectives do it on television.”

“They only have an hour. They have to take short cuts.”

—§—

“Why did Mrs. Terwilliger fire us, Gaspard?” Al Fratelli was seething on the other end of the line. “I don’t know, Mr. Fratelli.” Dan piled the mail on the dining room table, then walked to the bedroom.

“You have to know, Gaspard. She told me she helped you trail the other woman last night. Is that right?”

“Unavoidable. The woman showed up and tried to do the same trick in the mall, so I sent Mrs. Terwilliger in to watch.”

“So what happened?”

Dan flopped onto his bed. “I don’t know. Neither of them came out, at least the through the exit I had covered.” Dan stared vacantly at the closet door, his eye attracted by the silvery boots sticking up from Mary Ann’s shoes. 'What did she wear those for?'

“Well that explains everything to me. She found out who the girl was herself and doesn’t need us anymore. Thanks a lot, Gaspard.”

Dan walked over to the closet and looked at the bag the boots were in. “Look, Mr. Fratelli, I am sorry. I don’t know what else to say.”

“Say ‘I won’t allow clients on stakeout any more or I’m fired’, Gaspard.”

“I won’t, sir.”

“You’d better not.” Fratelli disconnected.

Dan heard a knock on the apartment front door. He sprinted quickly to the front door and looked through the peephole. It was Natalie Terwilliger. He opened the door.

“Mrs. Terwilliger, what are you doing here?”

“I’m glad to see you found it, too. She’s not here, is she?”

“Who’s not here?”

“You know who; the tramp with the outer space hair.”

'The intergalactic meter maid.' “Mrs. Terwilliger. You followed her here?”

“Yes, but her name isn’t on any of the mailboxes. I checked.” Mrs. Terwilliger brushed past him and into the room. “It doesn’t matter though. Now that I know for sure he’s cheating on me, I knew what I had to do.”

Dan’s face became ashen. “What did you do?”

“I made sure that John got exactly the room I wanted him to and then I left him a little present.”

“Present?”

“I gave him a clock. He’ll get a bang out of it.” Mrs. Terwilliger giggled as Dan grabbed up his phone. “Once I am a rich widow, I was wondering if you’d want to rub my neck.” Dan speed dialed Mary Ann. “Dan?”

“Get--”

Dan heard the start of the explosion. The next thing he heard was the voices of the police officers prying his fingers from Mrs. Terwilliger’s lifeless throat.