There were so many things that Joel Klutz-Turner let slide. Things like his maid forever making the mistake of putting his clothes in the dryer on high. What did it matter to him? Clothes go out of style too fast to be bothered anyway. He made no complaint when his secretary dropped a call she was supposed to be transferring it. He could live with her redialing, it only took a moment. He even looked the other way when one of his workers was late or missed a shift for getting a DUI or domestic violence charge. After all, it was their problem, not his as long as the job got done on time. Yet, for whatever reason it could have been, Joel decided to go over to Central and Fourth Street, in what outwardly appeared to be a displayless shopping center store that was closed to the public, on that Saturday afternoon for the first time despite having been a stakeholder since it was started.
He walked in wearing his usual wrinkled slacks and a polo shirt that he had picked up off his bedroom floor because he didn't feel like grabbing a clean set from the hanger in his closet. His hair was unwashed, slicked back the way he liked it from his accumulated oils holding it firmly in place. With lips that had white flakes from being chapped, Joel thought this was otherwise hidden under a straggly beard growing in as it did in patches. He caught the manager, Scott off guard when he went to the register to personally take stock of the day's till. "Hey!" He shouted putting his hand on Turner's shoulder. Once Turner faced him though, Scott knew immediately who he was confronting. Turner was the big man in town and he knew it. Scott profusely apologized, "I'm so sorry about that, sir. I thought you were...someone else."
Turner, with his too thick of veneers for front teeth that clicked against his tongue, downplayed the mistake and reassured Scott by saying"It's fine. I'm here to do an unannounced audit." Scott trying to please the owner of nearly every business in town took him to the side office where the books were kept on a beat-up laptop. Turner scrolled the reports without much interest. He had an objective that he kept to himself. Scott awkwardly stood by, until Turner told him that he'd be a while and to go check over the kitchen for an OSHA walk-through that was happening in the upcoming week.
Scott complied leaving Turner in the office alone. It wasn't long before Thallea came back in from the alleyway stinking of cigarette smoke with the remains of fallen ashes sprinkled on her protruding pregnant belly that was hardly covered by her tight tee shirt. Turner could overhear Scott telling Thallea to scrub the warmer. She hissed a counter-response of "Do it yourself, Jeez. I'm too pregnant for that shit, dumbass." Scott was about to either carefully reprimand her or plead with her when Turner came out of the office having had his curiosity satisfied. Turner announced his exit, saying, "I've got another few stops to do. I'll be on my way. Be ready for that inspection. The books look good. Great job everyone." The door had narrowly missed hitting his back as he went out as quickly as he could.
That night at the house Jena was picking up after Thallea despite being dead tired from a double shift at the daycare. Jena missed her adorable companion Tiki, who was now essentially Mrs. Flossie's pet bird. Thallea burst in with an unusually perky disposition. Jena lifting a full trash bag to place by the door to take out on her way to work in the morning couldn't help but ask, "What has you in such a good mood?" Thallea who would typically come in griping about something or another that any reasonable person would not have taken issue with, in an uncharacteristically upbeat tone replied, "I met Turner today. He was so nice. He told me I was doing a great job and everything at work! Thanks so much for getting me this job. I can tell he likes me a lot." Then Thallea merrily went to her room slamming the door shut. Jena stood there thinking that Thallea was saying something strange because Turner didn't like anyone he didn't already know, but she shrugged it off assuming he had been making polite conversation with her.
The next day when Jena came home Thallea was waiting for her in the wings by the stairs. "Sis, can you take me to the salon? I want to get my hair done before Beau comes back through this weekend." Jena hadn't heard Beau was coming to visit since Thallea had told him off for stopping by the last time because she thought he needed to be out making money to send to her. It was no secret that Thallea had tucked away Beau's earnings into an account only she had access to. Jena remembered her yelling at her brother, "You left me here and now you're back with nothing in hand for our babies? What's wrong with you? Get your butt back on the road!" Jena had hoped that by letting Beau see just how monetarily focused Thallea was he'd start to put his foot down with her in that relationship, but he continued to ignore Thallea's brightly lit red flags.
Jena was in a lose-lose situation whenever she tried to address the issue with Beau who would remind her that Thallea was carrying his twins and that he was not about to be a single father again. Jena had lost so much respect for him from the searing secondhand embarrassment that Thallea's behavior toward Beau caused. Jena couldn't watch their exchanges anymore, it was truly unbearable.
"Sure I'll take you," Jena answered knowing that Thallea only wanted the ride so she could stiff her with the bill. The mall south of them was mostly empty except for a few roving teenagers and the elderly in-door speed walkers. Jena had always hated going there, even back when the place was bustling almost twenty years ago. The food court always smelled like vomit to her. The parking lot seemed to perpetually be littered with broken glass. Worse of all the merchandise for sale was wholly overpriced and required a customer like herself to settle rather than finding what she wanted in her correct size. To Jena it was a waste of the day, always ending with sore feet. Thallea though, loved the place. It was her utopia. She wandered with glee. Everything was hers for the taking with the help of Jena's credit card or her five-finger discount. Her pregnancy didn't slow her in the slightest as she bounced from store to store. There was nothing she didn't feel that she was immediately in need of no matter how seemingly impractical. Jena could hardly keep up.
In the salon, Thallea had zebra-highlighted extensions sewn into her heavily layered hair. She had her eyebrows waxed in the shape of thin commas. Her nails had to have the longest most bejeweled acrylics offered. To pull it all together Thallea had to have everything waxed, including the tops of her toes which grew thick black hairs. Jena scrolled through her phone, planning her next trip to go to see Nate after her shift the following evening. He of course continued to show no sign of improvement. However, after the turn of events in court, Ivy-Mae suddenly began to feel it was "unethical" to continue to keep her son on life support. Jena wondered if there was anything sacred to that woman. Every fiber of whatever her morals were composed of seemed to be able to be bought off cheaply. Jena made more trips to see Nate as a result just to know what his status was because Ivy-Mae seemed to take advantage of the distance between them. Even the ever-vigilant Gus had gone back to the life he was living before Nate's accident. All parties involved seemed to be in quiet agreement that Nate had died the night of the party. Each of them had their reasons for keeping up the charade of pretending it wasn't so, Jena now included.
The mall was closed by the time that Thallea finished. The stylist approached Jena for payment, holding out her hand for Jena to put her credit card into it. Jena was not pleased with losing what little money she had for such a frivolous endeavor, but she did want to help Beau's partner rekindle with him in any way she could. On the way back to the house Jena tried to make small talk with Thallea in hopes that she wouldn't smoke with the windows rolled up. It was as if everything Thallea touched became trashy. Jena liked her car. She felt like she was practically living in it with all the driving she had to do. Thallea making it smell like a sleazy motel toilet was just another thing she felt was taken from her that she found comfort in. "You seem excited to see Beau tomorrow," Jena said. Thallea clicking her freshly done nails on the armrest answered, "I guess I just really missed my man." Jena could tell she was thinking about something else. Thallea cranked up the radio in the car before Jena could get much else out of her.
When they arrived at the house, Thallea went right to bed. Jena, who could not stomach the food at the mall went into the kitchen seeking a snack that Thallea hadn't taken a bite out of and put back into the packing. Jena found an old frozen vegan meal from a long-forgotten diet Nate had been trying. The packing must have looked too healthy for the likes of Thallea to have gotten into. Either way, Jena was glad to have it for herself. Jena looked around her once lovely home, noticing all of the ruin Thallea's stay there had been incurring. The walls were smugged with God's knows what. The windows had hand prints on them, sprinkled with splashed something or another. The dishes were all chipped, The cutlery was scrapped up from Thallea sticking it in the garbage disposal to push down the muck she had backed up the sink with. The hand-crafted oak table had burn marks, and deep scratches in it. Jena half laughed at the idea of turning over the house to Ivy-Mae with the condition that she be required to accept Thallea as a permanent domical pest.
When her food was ready Jena pushed some of the the used wrappers Thallea had piled up to the side of her plate. Among them was a napkin with scribbled writing on it that Jena decided seemed like something Thallea would want to keep. As she more closely examined it, Jena could see that it was Thallea's upcoming shift hours for the week. Jena chewed her gluten-free meal and read it over. "Why was Thallea doing so many more hours this week?" Jena wondered because Thallea had been moaning about her back hurting from what few hours she already had. Thallea had made a speech about wanting to go in only one day a week "tops" just a few days prior. Now Thallea was on the schedule to be at the ghost kitchen full time. Jena found it to be quite odd. As opposed to throwing out the wrappers, Jena placed them back as they were on the top, acting as if she hadn't seen them at all. Jena went about her business as usual.
Jena couldn't shake the feeling that something wasn't adding up more so than normal with Thallea. She waited until she was on the road again alone with her thoughts to run her suspicions in her mind. It was a bit of time, so much in fact that she was essentially on autopilot until she passed the dip in the road where the speeding car had nearly clipped her that night she went to relieve herself on the roadside. Jena realized it was a blindspot, and that the driver had likely not been able to see her even if it had been daylight, which it wasn't at the time. With uncertainty eating away at her, Jena called Beau to see how it was going over at the house for him with Thallea.
He picked up the call on the first ring. "I didn't think you'd be calling me so late. How's it going?" Beau answered. Jena wanting to act natural asked, "Oh, I'm just seeing if you and Thallea are doing okay at the house tonight." Beau chuckled, "The house? I'm about to pass Topeka on my way to Peoria." Jena was confused, as Beau spoke, "Plus, Jena between you and me, I wouldn't have answered your call if I were with Thallea." Jena could hear his truck's engine roar in the background of the call. She awkwardly redirected the conversation, "My mistake. I must have gotten the dates confused. When are you dropping by?" Beau replied, "Hell, I don't know. Thallea and I agreed that I keep going until the work dries up or she's having the babies. You know how it is." Jena had so much to say but not a soul to whom she could say it. She made chit-chat until she was about to drive into a dead zone, before hanging up on Beau.
Jena felt in her heart that something was amiss with Thallea, but reassured herself by considering, "What more could a wretch like her do?" With that thought a pit seemed to drop within her to the core. She wasn't sure exactly why, but knew from that day on, that the sight of her cold husband hooked up to machines that keep his organs moving was not the most ghastly thing she had to face.
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