Writing in Public – Story #1, Scene 1
My ideas usually come as scattered bits and pieces. This one started with the following:
The foot I broke in February (might as well put the time I spent to good use in a story)
Morro Bay, California. Take a moment to check out the rock on the link.
A grandmother.
This story will be up until July 15. Onto the story …
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Granny Logic
1
Nothing like having Granny on stakeout.
I slouched in my seat and watched the fog drift outside Granny’s Ford Auto-Driver car. It was like a cat that came in and sat on your face. Didn’t care, didn’t deign to care. The Pismo Beach morning was thick with it, all damp and prickly, a chill riding under. What I liked about the fog was that it had a way of quieting the world, bringing everything back to order.
Especially with everything so upside-down. I’d never expected that I would be tracking a worker’s comp fraud with my grandmother, Patty King.
My nose itched. The car smelled of Hawaiian Tropic and Tiger Balm. The sunblock was all mine, since all the sun needed to do was look at me and I was overcooked toast. Even with fog blotting out the early-morning, there was already enough sun to do that. The Tiger Balm was all Granny. She sat comfortably in the driver’s seat, checking out a buff guy in white board shorts running past. Jingle, jangle, jingle went his keys.
I looked, too. Mighty fine legs.
Granny was my father’s mother, and the last surviving grandparent I had. Everyone forgot how old she was most of the time because she never stopped moving. She volunteered for everything … a play at a stage in San Luis Obispo, writing a column for the Tribune, and lately, chauffeuring me. She even worked out at the gym. Weight lifting. No kidding. Granny had biceps.
Me? I had to do ‘Take Your Granny to Work Day’ because I’d broken my right foot. I rested my bare foot on the medical boot that looked more space age than the car was. The foot was still swollen and distressingly bruised–how did breaking the side end up with the entire foot bruised?
I glanced at the house we were watching. We’d parked across the street, three doors down. The house was one of those clapboards, painted a shade of blue that aged dingy, and surrounded by wild hair bushes. A bagged newspaper lay on the grass in front of the door.
The occupant was Martin Harrington. The insurance company I was working for suspected a fraudulent worker’s compensation claim for a back injury. So I was out here with my camera, hoping for video footage of Harrington doing the illegal.
So far, he wasn’t cooperating. I’d hoped I’d get a good surveillance session out of the way before my podiatrist appointment.
“Is it always this…this…dull?” Granny asked.
People always though P.I.ing was far more exciting than the reality. Granny had liked James Garner and The Rockford Files, so she was probably picturing gun fights and car chases. She hadn’t come with me thinking she was going to get into a car chase, did she?
Of course, it was harder to do now with the auto-drive cars. Even tailing another car was more challenging.
“Surveillance is probably the most boring part of being a P.I,” I said. “It’s like you’re out in the woods hunting a unicorn, and there’s only one. You have to wait and wait until you see the gleam on his horn, then try not to let him see you. I like digging around in the research better.”
I knew why she’d volunteered to help me out: She wanted to see what attracted me to being a private investigator.. I wasn’t even sure I could explain it myself. The rest of the family either kept asking me when I was going to get a real job or pretending like I did a ‘normal job.’
Whatever that was.
“So are you briefing the rest of the family on what I do?” I asked.
A flush colored her pale cheeks. “Some of them asked.”
“You know, they could listen to what I said. Instead, they just gossip.”
My tone was more clipped than I intended. It was like they didn’t like what I told them so they made weird shit up. And I do mean weird. But Granny hadn’t been part of that. She normally stayed out of the family squalls.
“Sorry,” I said. “My foot is making me cranky.”
She grinned at me crookedly. “Blame the foot.”
“Sure why not? Makes more sense than trying to figure out why everyone is nuts.”
“Believe me I’ve been asking that question for years. You won’t get any answers that make sense.” Granny leaned forward, peering out through the windshield. “That him?”
The screen door banged shut, and Harrington emerged from the house. I raised my video camera and turned it on, speaking the date and time so it would record. The film also carried a date stamp, but you could never been too careful when it came to going to court.
Harrington stared out at the fog like it annoyed him. He’d thrown on a ratty striped bathrobe over shorts and a white t-shirt, leaving the robe to flap open. He hadn’t shaved yet this morning, which made him look slovenly. He was what I called ‘almost handsome’—all the parts were there, but arranged in a way that made him unmemorable. He’d tried acting in Hollywood for a few years, but hadn’t been able to get work beyond ‘ guy in a business suit.’ Been equally unmemorable in the corporate world.
He came down the three steps to the grass. A languid movement, like he didn’t have the energy to care. He reached the newspaper and squatted, picking it up.
“He knows someone might be watching,” Granny said.
“Sooner or later, he’ll forget.”
Filed under: Writing in Public Tagged: California, First Person, Morro Bay, Mystery, pantsing, Private Detective, Writing in Public, Writing in the Dark
