The Stakes

I wind the phone cord around my pinkie finger and count seven rungs before unwinding it again.  I sit, and I listen.  If I had to pick between my mother-in-law’s rants about bingo at the Senior Center and this time-share crap that is currently taking my time, I honestly don’t know that I would have a preference.

You see, my wife and I went to Vegas last year.  Stayed in one of those fancy hotels with expensive names that cost as much as the electric bill in July.  My wife bought shoes she couldn’t afford and I gambled all the overtime for the year that I haven’t even worked yet.  I mean, we really lived it up.

So now, if we want to go back to Vegas and see a show and eat the seafood buffet, my wife informs me we have to listen to Reginaldo talk about Jamaica and the Virgin Islands and price tags that are more than my yearly salary.  I’m sitting here, winding the cord around my pinkie again, thinking, Really, Re-he-nal-do?  If I could afford this vacation home, would I be listening to you for an hour so I could get a Vegas voucher?

Linda breezes by my desk, smelling like a tropical vacation herself.  I shiver just a little bit when she drops a letter on my desk because her fingernails are this poppin’ blood-orange and I can almost feel them on my neck.  While I’m looking at Linda’s gorgeous hands, I happen to see my own and suddenly the sixteenth ounce of gold I wear on my left hand feels really tight and heavy. 

Reginaldo is still talking when I give myself a paper cut on the letter I open.  “Dear Santa,” says the first line and I drop the phone.  Only one person has ever called me that and it’s been ages.

“I know I’ve caused you a lot of grief, but there’s something I need that only you can get for me.  For all that we ever had, for all you ever felt for me, please don’t tell anyone about this.”

It isn’t even signed, but I have no doubts.  My mouth goes dry as I realize the implications of the letter.  Veronica is in prison and I doubt she is there for breaking hearts. 

I honestly have no idea what it is that she wants me to do, but when she says only I can get it for her I’m pretty sure I know where to look.  We had this secret, see, when we were in high school.  We graduated with the class of ’95, wore matching green and white shirts that said Go Pandas, and there wasn’t a whole lot we wouldn’t do for each other.  Until Veronica killed her sister.  Things just weren’t the same after that.

Fifteen years later and she comes back to haunt me, the ghost of a woman not dead.  I hang up on Reginaldo and grab my jacket, headed for the door.   She left something in that vent duct at the high school, I just know it.  Something that is going to ruin me and I have to get to it first.  Because you see, Veronica didn’t exactly kill her sister by herself.