Aunt Dottie is really the author's Aunt Dot. Punxsutawney is a real town,
and Phil is a real groundhog.
Details of the local geography have been somewhat altered, but the author has tried to retain the small town atmosphere that she remembers from visiting Punx'y and surrounding areas in her misspent youth.
(Chapter 32. February 1. Pittsburgh International Airport.)
"Steve, baby, wake up. We're here."
Steve woke slowly to the quiet murmurs of weary travelers gathering their things. He yawned, stretched, turned to Olivia, and smiled.
"Home sweet home?"
Olivia smiled back weakly. She looked scared.
"Actually, home is another two and a half hours on the road."
"Oh. Well, what time is it?"
"It's about ten after three in the morning. That makes it ten after midnight back in LA. It's eighteen degrees and windy, so thank me for making you wear your longies."
He grinned and kissed her and said, "Thank you, dear."
Olivia still looked scared.
"You all right, Liv?"
"I haven't slept in days, Steve, and I'm nervous as a cucumber in a pickle factory."
He laughed, "A nervous cucumber with a sense of humor. That'll help, Liv, and so will I."
She smiled again, this time with a little more confidence and said, "Thanks, babe."
They gathered their things and exited the plane. They moved to the lower level, and as they searched for the baggage claim, a blast of cold wind from an open door finally brought Steve fully awake. "Jeeze, Liv! How do people live like this?"
She handed him a toboggan hat and some gloves, and laughed at him.
"They work hard to keep warm during the day, and they cuddle up at night."
"Now that cuddling part might not be so bad," Steve admitted thoughtfully as he gratefully slipped the gloves on. He stuffed the hat in his pocket.
Olivia took hold of his arm and wrapped it around her shoulders as she strolled along by his side. "We have some time to practice right now," she told him.
He kissed the top of her head, and said, "I'd be delighted." Noticing her bare hands, he asked, "Where are your gloves?"
"I never wear them. I just don't like them because you can't feel a darned thing. I use my pockets. Besides, it's a good excuse for you to hold my hand."
Steve laughed, "You're something else, you know that?"
"That's one of the politest names I've ever been called."
They soon found the baggage carrousel, and Olivia gave him the claim tickets.
"We'll get home just in time for the early breakfast at Casey's Diner, then I figured we'd just drive around a while. I want to see the sights before we start visiting."
"Ok. Whatever you say, love."
"You're so obliging."
"I am a stranger in a strange land. I'm just thankful for the long underwear, coat, and gloves."
Olivia laughed at him again. "Don't forget the hat. You'll want to put that on soon enough."
He was glad to see she was loosening up.
"There's no sense in both of us standing around, babe," Olivia said and kissed him. "You get the bags, I'm going to pick up the car, and meet you right outside."
"Wait, Liv. All rental cars look the same. How will I know it's you?"
She gave him a mischievous grin and said, "It's not a rental. You'll know it when you see it."
Steve wondered at that, but just shrugged his shoulders and said, "There's no way I'm coming outside until I see you. If you get tired of waiting, come get me."
"Ok," she agreed, "but I won't have to."
Steve knew she was up to something.
He went to the carrousel and got their suitcases, then stood at the exit doors looking for Olivia.
"I'll be damned!" he breathed.
She had pulled up in that unbearably pink jeep of hers. She'd put the top on, which was a good thing considering the cold. He noticed heads turning and smiles breaking out as he walked over and loaded up the bags. Maybe it wasn't so awful after all.
"I see you spotted me."
"How could I not?" He climbed in, and as she pulled away from the curb, he adjusted the heat to his liking. He sat back with a sigh and basked in the warmth.
After a few moments, he asked her, "How and why the hell did you bring this thing out here?"
"Language, babe."
"Sorry, but please answer my question."
"Well, there's an orderly at the hospital who's always talking about wanting to see the country. I told him I would pay him two weeks wages to drive my car here and park it, and then I would fly him back to LA first class. All he had to do was get it here by today. He parked it for me and called me with the lot and row number. I paid to get it out of the lot. End of story."
"That's only the how, Liv. Now tell me why."
"People will recognize it and know I'm home. That way I don't have to call on everyone in town. Some folks'll come to me."
"Oh, very clever."
"Thank you."
Steve watched the road signs as they left the city. It was still dark, and there wasn't much else to see. On route twenty-eight they passed communities with names like Tarentum and Natrona Heights. At a town called Kittanning, he saw a sign pointing east to Indiana. This confused him, so he had to ask about it.
"Uh, Liv, I thought Indiana was that way." He pointed west. "Between Ohio and Illinois."
Olivia chuckled at him. "That's the state. Indiana, Pennsylvania is a university town and the hometown of Jimmy Stewart. IUP's a good school, and my daddy's Aunt Dottie once waited on Jimmy Stewart in her granddad's mercantile when he was home for a visit. Maybe we can visit the Jimmy Stewart Museum before we go back to LA."
"Ok. That sounds like it might be interesting."
They headed north for a little while on state route sixty-six, and at a place called New Bethlehem; he saw a sign for a place with an improbable name. He had time to sound it out as Olivia was driving slowly on snowy roads.
"Punx-su-taw-ney? What in the world?"
"Ever see the movie 'Groundhog Day'?"
"Yeah…Oh! No way. People really live there? I thought it was just for the holiday. Like the North Pole at Christmas."
"Way, babe. It is a real town with good people and a high school. Gobbler's Knob is real, too, and so is the groundhog. My place is in the woods off route 36 in the middle of the triangle formed by Brookville, DuBois, and Punx'y. Casey's Diner is across from the school."
"Is that where you went to school?"
"Yep."
They crossed a bridge and came to a "T" intersection at the end of 536 and Olivia sat at the stop sign for a long while. She had gone ghost-pale. Steve didn't know what to do or say, so he just waited. After a bit, she spoke.
"Mind if we pull over for a bit?"
"It's up to you."
She crossed the road and pulled over. Steve suddenly realized they were at the base of a cliff.
"Liv?"
"I'm ok, Steve." She was holding the steering wheel in a white-knuckle grip and staring out the windshield. Steve could see her arms trembling.
He reached over and put a hand on hers.
"I'm ok, really."
"We don't have to do this now, Liv."
With forced cheerfulness she said, "Nonsense. No time like the present!"
She let go of the steering wheel, threw the door open, leaped out, ran around the front of the jeep and up to the base of the cliff, and put her bare hands against the rocks. Steve could see scars on the stone, and he wondered if she had put them there.
He groaned as he got out of the jeep and the wind cut through him. He would prefer to stay warm inside the vehicle, but there was no way he could let her face this alone. He pulled the hat she had given him at the airport out of his pocket and put it on. He walked up to her and took her hands from the rocks. He held them in his, and put them inside her coat pockets. Then he took his hands out of her pockets and wrapped his arms around her.
"This is where you did it, huh?"
"Yep."
He waited for her to fill the silence. The only sounds were the shrilling of the wind and the chattering of teeth.
"I was driving a Chevy Blazer. Light blue. My…friends…called it 'Big Blue.' Keith had just called off the wedding. I was on my way home from trying to return my dress. The woman at the shop was so rude. She insisted that I couldn't get my money back. I had made a non-refundable deposit. She couldn't understand that I didn't care about the money. I just wanted to get rid of the stupid dress."
Steve could feel her whole body spasm as she struggled to keep from crying.
"You can cry if you want, Liv."
"I *don't* want to cry, Steve. I've spent most of my life crying. I want to stop and start over happy."
He turned her around to face him, and she buried her face in his chest. His coat muffled the rest of her story, but Steve caught it all.
"I'd been…depressed…since the attack, and all of a sudden I got to thinking how much my life had seemed to suck. It seemed that I had spent so much time being miserable and so very little time being happy, and I decided I didn't want to feel that way ever again. I knew I was going way too fast when I hit the bridge, I saw the stop sign, and I saw the rocks, and I saw a solution. I woke up a week later in ICU."
"It's a miracle you didn't succeed."
"That's what everyone said. Actually, they said it was a miracle I wasn't killed. Officially, it was an accident, and most folks didn't know any different. I believe that now, that I was being protected for another purpose, but at the time, it made me feel worthless. Like neither God nor the Devil wanted me. Most folks who were close to me around here know now that it was intentional, but the police report was never amended."
"Sometimes things like that fall by the wayside as we get busy with other cases," Steve told her.
"Yeah, I suppose, and sometimes they're put by the wayside, too."
"Sometimes, when it serves the greater good to do so."
She turned to face the rocks again, and leaned back against him.
"It's been so long since I was that miserable, I don't even remember what it feels like." She sighed deeply. "Thank God."
Steve could only say one thing, "Amen."
They turned to go back to the jeep only to find a county sheriff's cruiser pulling up alongside them. The officer got out and peered at them for a long moment in the gray light of dawn. Olivia waved and called, "Beechie? You're a deputy now?"
"O? Is it really you?" He moved a few steps closer. "Olivia Margaret Regis! God in Heaven! Where ya been?"
"Oh, here and there, Beechie." She walked toward him with her arms stretched out for a hug, and Steve followed a couple of steps behind. The deputy was considerably taller than Olivia, but not quite so tall as Steve. When she got to him, he wrapped his arms around her and lifted her off her feet in a joyful, growling bear hug.
Setting her down, Beechie told her, "Turn around and let me look at you."
Liv did as instructed, and he said, "You look good, O. What brings you home after all this time?"
"Burying skeletons and exorcising ghosts, I guess. I have to face the past before I can look to the future." She took Steve by the hand and pulled him forward to join the conversation. "Arnold Beech, meet Detective Lieutenant Steve Sloan of the LAPD, homicide division. Steve, Beechie and I went to school together."
As the two shook hands, Beechie said, "Don't let her fool you. She went to school and dragged me along."
"You did the work, Beechie, I just provided the incentive."
"Incentive my eye, O." Looking at Steve he said, "She bribed me, and there's no other word for it."
"Oh? How'd she do that?" Steve asked grinning.
Beechie laughed. "She promised to give me exactly what I wanted."
At Steve's questioning look, Beechie elaborated. "I was a trouble maker, got suspended a couple times a year. I pretty much figured I was going to drop out and work in the coalmines or at the paper mill. One day I noticed she had a 'for sale' sign on her granddad's '57 Chevy, and I asked her how much she wanted. She put me off and put me off, saying, 'I'll let you know when I decide.' One day the car was gone. I went to her and threw a wall- eyed fit, 'You said you'd let me know.' She told me to relax and showed me that she had moved it back into the shed. 'My price,' she said, 'is a high school diploma.' On graduation day, she handed me the keys and the title."
Liv laughed and said, "That car was just a carrot, Beechie. You worked like a mule to earn it." She turned to Steve and said, "He was a seventeen year old freshman, but he managed to graduate in the top twenty. He made such a turnaround, the National Honor Society even got special permission to forgive his early discipline problems and induct him."
Beechie lowered his head, kicked at the gravel, and said softly, "You always could play me like a banjo, O. You knew what I wanted and what I needed and you made sure I got them both." There was a quiet pause, after which Beechie said, "Well, I hate to break this up, but there's a shift change at the cheese packing plant in about twenty minutes. If people see this pink blast from the past here, they'll start rubbernecking and we'll have a wreck."
"They've reopened the plant?"
"As if you didn't know. Speculation's been running wild, O, and I know it's rude to ask, but how much did you sink into that old hulk?"
Olivia's eyes were wide open as she shook her head. "I have no idea, Beechie. In fact, I didn't know I had any money in it. Meyer Goldstein handles all my finances. When did it open?"
Beechie shrugged. "End of August, beginning of September. You really didn't know?"
Steve and Liv exchanged a meaningful glance and Olivia said, "No, I didn't, but I had a lot going on at the time, and Meyer knows I trust him. He probably decided not to bother me with the details at the time and then forgot."
"Kinda hard to forget a couple million dollars, isn't it?" Beechie asked. "That's what the rumors say anyhow."
"It's not hard to forget when you handle as much money and manage as many accounts as Meyer Goldstein, and rumors are invented and perpetuated by people so dull and dimwitted they are bored with their own lives. That is why they have to make everyone else's seem so interesting."
Beechie nodded amiably and said, "At any rate, O, you ought to look into it. See if you really are involved. Now, I hate to do it, but I really have to ask you to move on."
She gave the deputy another hug and a kiss on the check and said, "We were ready to go get some breakfast at Casey's, anyway. It's good to see you Beechie. Come by the house some time. We'll be staying at least two weeks."
"Ok, O, and I'll bring Lou and the kids."
Confusion crossed Olivia's face, then she grabbed Beechie's left hand and said, "A wedding band? Lou?" Realization dawned, "LOUISE! Crandoll? OH MY GOD!!! I knew you two would hook up. How many kids?"
Beechie nodded, "Nine-year-old twins. Arthur and Virginia. Lou and I have already decided. Art gets the Chevy when they graduate, and Ginny gets the Jeep. And they both get all the history that go with them."
"Oh, Beechie, that's super. Do bring the kids by. Say after church for Sunday dinner?"
"I'll check with Lou. Is there a number I can call?"
"I dunno. Meyer was supposed to have the phone hooked up at the house, but I don't know the number. Are you in the book?"
"Yep, under A. & L. Beech."
"Ok. I'll call you then." She blew him a kiss as she and Steve got in the jeep and said, "Have a nice day, and work safely."
Beechie waved and got in his cruiser and they parted ways.
Olivia headed south on route thirty-six toward Punxsutawney. She kept up a steady stream of delighted chatter about how she was so glad for Beechie and Lou and how they'd had a hot and cold running romance all through school. She did not notice at first that Steve was staring darkly out the window, but when she finally stopped her mile-a-minute talking and looked over at him, she knew something was wrong.
"Wow, Steve, that's a thundercloud if ever I saw one," she said reaching out to caress his angry features.
Surprisingly, he jerked away from her.
They were coming up on a steep hill, and she had to downshift, so she drew her hand away, but she didn't let the issue pass.
"Talk to me, babe. What's the matter?"
Steve shrugged.
"Talking requires verbal communication. What's wrong?"
Steve took a deep breath and let it out. "He used to be in love with you," he said sulkily.
"Beechie?" Olivia rolled her eyes. "Get real, Steve. He's happily married with two kids."
"Doesn't matter, Liv, when he hugged you, he was seventeen again, and this time he had the girl of his dreams in his arms."
"Steve," she said in exasperation, "he was a third-year freshman and I was the little genius who started high school at thirteen years old. His daddy was a miner and his mama kept the books at the paper mill. My folks were farmers. We had nothing in common."
"You and I don't have much in common, either," he challenged.
"But we're together now, right?" she asked, with a glint in her eye.
"Right!" he agreed angrily, snapping up the bait before he knew it was on a hook.
"So, a twenty-year-old romance that never was shouldn't trouble you. After all, a strong, handsome, virile, fully (and I do mean fully)," she said with a giggle in her voice, "grown man such as yourself has no reason to be jealous of a horny seventeen-year-old who is no more and couldn't get my attention with a red cape when he was. Right?"
Steve tried his best to stay angry for a minute more, but when she caught his eye and grinned, he couldn't help but laugh at his own foolishness.
"Right," he agreed laughingly, "but who said I was jealous?"
Still, Olivia noticed he was uncharacteristically quiet for the rest of the drive to the diner.
Details of the local geography have been somewhat altered, but the author has tried to retain the small town atmosphere that she remembers from visiting Punx'y and surrounding areas in her misspent youth.
(Chapter 32. February 1. Pittsburgh International Airport.)
"Steve, baby, wake up. We're here."
Steve woke slowly to the quiet murmurs of weary travelers gathering their things. He yawned, stretched, turned to Olivia, and smiled.
"Home sweet home?"
Olivia smiled back weakly. She looked scared.
"Actually, home is another two and a half hours on the road."
"Oh. Well, what time is it?"
"It's about ten after three in the morning. That makes it ten after midnight back in LA. It's eighteen degrees and windy, so thank me for making you wear your longies."
He grinned and kissed her and said, "Thank you, dear."
Olivia still looked scared.
"You all right, Liv?"
"I haven't slept in days, Steve, and I'm nervous as a cucumber in a pickle factory."
He laughed, "A nervous cucumber with a sense of humor. That'll help, Liv, and so will I."
She smiled again, this time with a little more confidence and said, "Thanks, babe."
They gathered their things and exited the plane. They moved to the lower level, and as they searched for the baggage claim, a blast of cold wind from an open door finally brought Steve fully awake. "Jeeze, Liv! How do people live like this?"
She handed him a toboggan hat and some gloves, and laughed at him.
"They work hard to keep warm during the day, and they cuddle up at night."
"Now that cuddling part might not be so bad," Steve admitted thoughtfully as he gratefully slipped the gloves on. He stuffed the hat in his pocket.
Olivia took hold of his arm and wrapped it around her shoulders as she strolled along by his side. "We have some time to practice right now," she told him.
He kissed the top of her head, and said, "I'd be delighted." Noticing her bare hands, he asked, "Where are your gloves?"
"I never wear them. I just don't like them because you can't feel a darned thing. I use my pockets. Besides, it's a good excuse for you to hold my hand."
Steve laughed, "You're something else, you know that?"
"That's one of the politest names I've ever been called."
They soon found the baggage carrousel, and Olivia gave him the claim tickets.
"We'll get home just in time for the early breakfast at Casey's Diner, then I figured we'd just drive around a while. I want to see the sights before we start visiting."
"Ok. Whatever you say, love."
"You're so obliging."
"I am a stranger in a strange land. I'm just thankful for the long underwear, coat, and gloves."
Olivia laughed at him again. "Don't forget the hat. You'll want to put that on soon enough."
He was glad to see she was loosening up.
"There's no sense in both of us standing around, babe," Olivia said and kissed him. "You get the bags, I'm going to pick up the car, and meet you right outside."
"Wait, Liv. All rental cars look the same. How will I know it's you?"
She gave him a mischievous grin and said, "It's not a rental. You'll know it when you see it."
Steve wondered at that, but just shrugged his shoulders and said, "There's no way I'm coming outside until I see you. If you get tired of waiting, come get me."
"Ok," she agreed, "but I won't have to."
Steve knew she was up to something.
He went to the carrousel and got their suitcases, then stood at the exit doors looking for Olivia.
"I'll be damned!" he breathed.
She had pulled up in that unbearably pink jeep of hers. She'd put the top on, which was a good thing considering the cold. He noticed heads turning and smiles breaking out as he walked over and loaded up the bags. Maybe it wasn't so awful after all.
"I see you spotted me."
"How could I not?" He climbed in, and as she pulled away from the curb, he adjusted the heat to his liking. He sat back with a sigh and basked in the warmth.
After a few moments, he asked her, "How and why the hell did you bring this thing out here?"
"Language, babe."
"Sorry, but please answer my question."
"Well, there's an orderly at the hospital who's always talking about wanting to see the country. I told him I would pay him two weeks wages to drive my car here and park it, and then I would fly him back to LA first class. All he had to do was get it here by today. He parked it for me and called me with the lot and row number. I paid to get it out of the lot. End of story."
"That's only the how, Liv. Now tell me why."
"People will recognize it and know I'm home. That way I don't have to call on everyone in town. Some folks'll come to me."
"Oh, very clever."
"Thank you."
Steve watched the road signs as they left the city. It was still dark, and there wasn't much else to see. On route twenty-eight they passed communities with names like Tarentum and Natrona Heights. At a town called Kittanning, he saw a sign pointing east to Indiana. This confused him, so he had to ask about it.
"Uh, Liv, I thought Indiana was that way." He pointed west. "Between Ohio and Illinois."
Olivia chuckled at him. "That's the state. Indiana, Pennsylvania is a university town and the hometown of Jimmy Stewart. IUP's a good school, and my daddy's Aunt Dottie once waited on Jimmy Stewart in her granddad's mercantile when he was home for a visit. Maybe we can visit the Jimmy Stewart Museum before we go back to LA."
"Ok. That sounds like it might be interesting."
They headed north for a little while on state route sixty-six, and at a place called New Bethlehem; he saw a sign for a place with an improbable name. He had time to sound it out as Olivia was driving slowly on snowy roads.
"Punx-su-taw-ney? What in the world?"
"Ever see the movie 'Groundhog Day'?"
"Yeah…Oh! No way. People really live there? I thought it was just for the holiday. Like the North Pole at Christmas."
"Way, babe. It is a real town with good people and a high school. Gobbler's Knob is real, too, and so is the groundhog. My place is in the woods off route 36 in the middle of the triangle formed by Brookville, DuBois, and Punx'y. Casey's Diner is across from the school."
"Is that where you went to school?"
"Yep."
They crossed a bridge and came to a "T" intersection at the end of 536 and Olivia sat at the stop sign for a long while. She had gone ghost-pale. Steve didn't know what to do or say, so he just waited. After a bit, she spoke.
"Mind if we pull over for a bit?"
"It's up to you."
She crossed the road and pulled over. Steve suddenly realized they were at the base of a cliff.
"Liv?"
"I'm ok, Steve." She was holding the steering wheel in a white-knuckle grip and staring out the windshield. Steve could see her arms trembling.
He reached over and put a hand on hers.
"I'm ok, really."
"We don't have to do this now, Liv."
With forced cheerfulness she said, "Nonsense. No time like the present!"
She let go of the steering wheel, threw the door open, leaped out, ran around the front of the jeep and up to the base of the cliff, and put her bare hands against the rocks. Steve could see scars on the stone, and he wondered if she had put them there.
He groaned as he got out of the jeep and the wind cut through him. He would prefer to stay warm inside the vehicle, but there was no way he could let her face this alone. He pulled the hat she had given him at the airport out of his pocket and put it on. He walked up to her and took her hands from the rocks. He held them in his, and put them inside her coat pockets. Then he took his hands out of her pockets and wrapped his arms around her.
"This is where you did it, huh?"
"Yep."
He waited for her to fill the silence. The only sounds were the shrilling of the wind and the chattering of teeth.
"I was driving a Chevy Blazer. Light blue. My…friends…called it 'Big Blue.' Keith had just called off the wedding. I was on my way home from trying to return my dress. The woman at the shop was so rude. She insisted that I couldn't get my money back. I had made a non-refundable deposit. She couldn't understand that I didn't care about the money. I just wanted to get rid of the stupid dress."
Steve could feel her whole body spasm as she struggled to keep from crying.
"You can cry if you want, Liv."
"I *don't* want to cry, Steve. I've spent most of my life crying. I want to stop and start over happy."
He turned her around to face him, and she buried her face in his chest. His coat muffled the rest of her story, but Steve caught it all.
"I'd been…depressed…since the attack, and all of a sudden I got to thinking how much my life had seemed to suck. It seemed that I had spent so much time being miserable and so very little time being happy, and I decided I didn't want to feel that way ever again. I knew I was going way too fast when I hit the bridge, I saw the stop sign, and I saw the rocks, and I saw a solution. I woke up a week later in ICU."
"It's a miracle you didn't succeed."
"That's what everyone said. Actually, they said it was a miracle I wasn't killed. Officially, it was an accident, and most folks didn't know any different. I believe that now, that I was being protected for another purpose, but at the time, it made me feel worthless. Like neither God nor the Devil wanted me. Most folks who were close to me around here know now that it was intentional, but the police report was never amended."
"Sometimes things like that fall by the wayside as we get busy with other cases," Steve told her.
"Yeah, I suppose, and sometimes they're put by the wayside, too."
"Sometimes, when it serves the greater good to do so."
She turned to face the rocks again, and leaned back against him.
"It's been so long since I was that miserable, I don't even remember what it feels like." She sighed deeply. "Thank God."
Steve could only say one thing, "Amen."
They turned to go back to the jeep only to find a county sheriff's cruiser pulling up alongside them. The officer got out and peered at them for a long moment in the gray light of dawn. Olivia waved and called, "Beechie? You're a deputy now?"
"O? Is it really you?" He moved a few steps closer. "Olivia Margaret Regis! God in Heaven! Where ya been?"
"Oh, here and there, Beechie." She walked toward him with her arms stretched out for a hug, and Steve followed a couple of steps behind. The deputy was considerably taller than Olivia, but not quite so tall as Steve. When she got to him, he wrapped his arms around her and lifted her off her feet in a joyful, growling bear hug.
Setting her down, Beechie told her, "Turn around and let me look at you."
Liv did as instructed, and he said, "You look good, O. What brings you home after all this time?"
"Burying skeletons and exorcising ghosts, I guess. I have to face the past before I can look to the future." She took Steve by the hand and pulled him forward to join the conversation. "Arnold Beech, meet Detective Lieutenant Steve Sloan of the LAPD, homicide division. Steve, Beechie and I went to school together."
As the two shook hands, Beechie said, "Don't let her fool you. She went to school and dragged me along."
"You did the work, Beechie, I just provided the incentive."
"Incentive my eye, O." Looking at Steve he said, "She bribed me, and there's no other word for it."
"Oh? How'd she do that?" Steve asked grinning.
Beechie laughed. "She promised to give me exactly what I wanted."
At Steve's questioning look, Beechie elaborated. "I was a trouble maker, got suspended a couple times a year. I pretty much figured I was going to drop out and work in the coalmines or at the paper mill. One day I noticed she had a 'for sale' sign on her granddad's '57 Chevy, and I asked her how much she wanted. She put me off and put me off, saying, 'I'll let you know when I decide.' One day the car was gone. I went to her and threw a wall- eyed fit, 'You said you'd let me know.' She told me to relax and showed me that she had moved it back into the shed. 'My price,' she said, 'is a high school diploma.' On graduation day, she handed me the keys and the title."
Liv laughed and said, "That car was just a carrot, Beechie. You worked like a mule to earn it." She turned to Steve and said, "He was a seventeen year old freshman, but he managed to graduate in the top twenty. He made such a turnaround, the National Honor Society even got special permission to forgive his early discipline problems and induct him."
Beechie lowered his head, kicked at the gravel, and said softly, "You always could play me like a banjo, O. You knew what I wanted and what I needed and you made sure I got them both." There was a quiet pause, after which Beechie said, "Well, I hate to break this up, but there's a shift change at the cheese packing plant in about twenty minutes. If people see this pink blast from the past here, they'll start rubbernecking and we'll have a wreck."
"They've reopened the plant?"
"As if you didn't know. Speculation's been running wild, O, and I know it's rude to ask, but how much did you sink into that old hulk?"
Olivia's eyes were wide open as she shook her head. "I have no idea, Beechie. In fact, I didn't know I had any money in it. Meyer Goldstein handles all my finances. When did it open?"
Beechie shrugged. "End of August, beginning of September. You really didn't know?"
Steve and Liv exchanged a meaningful glance and Olivia said, "No, I didn't, but I had a lot going on at the time, and Meyer knows I trust him. He probably decided not to bother me with the details at the time and then forgot."
"Kinda hard to forget a couple million dollars, isn't it?" Beechie asked. "That's what the rumors say anyhow."
"It's not hard to forget when you handle as much money and manage as many accounts as Meyer Goldstein, and rumors are invented and perpetuated by people so dull and dimwitted they are bored with their own lives. That is why they have to make everyone else's seem so interesting."
Beechie nodded amiably and said, "At any rate, O, you ought to look into it. See if you really are involved. Now, I hate to do it, but I really have to ask you to move on."
She gave the deputy another hug and a kiss on the check and said, "We were ready to go get some breakfast at Casey's, anyway. It's good to see you Beechie. Come by the house some time. We'll be staying at least two weeks."
"Ok, O, and I'll bring Lou and the kids."
Confusion crossed Olivia's face, then she grabbed Beechie's left hand and said, "A wedding band? Lou?" Realization dawned, "LOUISE! Crandoll? OH MY GOD!!! I knew you two would hook up. How many kids?"
Beechie nodded, "Nine-year-old twins. Arthur and Virginia. Lou and I have already decided. Art gets the Chevy when they graduate, and Ginny gets the Jeep. And they both get all the history that go with them."
"Oh, Beechie, that's super. Do bring the kids by. Say after church for Sunday dinner?"
"I'll check with Lou. Is there a number I can call?"
"I dunno. Meyer was supposed to have the phone hooked up at the house, but I don't know the number. Are you in the book?"
"Yep, under A. & L. Beech."
"Ok. I'll call you then." She blew him a kiss as she and Steve got in the jeep and said, "Have a nice day, and work safely."
Beechie waved and got in his cruiser and they parted ways.
Olivia headed south on route thirty-six toward Punxsutawney. She kept up a steady stream of delighted chatter about how she was so glad for Beechie and Lou and how they'd had a hot and cold running romance all through school. She did not notice at first that Steve was staring darkly out the window, but when she finally stopped her mile-a-minute talking and looked over at him, she knew something was wrong.
"Wow, Steve, that's a thundercloud if ever I saw one," she said reaching out to caress his angry features.
Surprisingly, he jerked away from her.
They were coming up on a steep hill, and she had to downshift, so she drew her hand away, but she didn't let the issue pass.
"Talk to me, babe. What's the matter?"
Steve shrugged.
"Talking requires verbal communication. What's wrong?"
Steve took a deep breath and let it out. "He used to be in love with you," he said sulkily.
"Beechie?" Olivia rolled her eyes. "Get real, Steve. He's happily married with two kids."
"Doesn't matter, Liv, when he hugged you, he was seventeen again, and this time he had the girl of his dreams in his arms."
"Steve," she said in exasperation, "he was a third-year freshman and I was the little genius who started high school at thirteen years old. His daddy was a miner and his mama kept the books at the paper mill. My folks were farmers. We had nothing in common."
"You and I don't have much in common, either," he challenged.
"But we're together now, right?" she asked, with a glint in her eye.
"Right!" he agreed angrily, snapping up the bait before he knew it was on a hook.
"So, a twenty-year-old romance that never was shouldn't trouble you. After all, a strong, handsome, virile, fully (and I do mean fully)," she said with a giggle in her voice, "grown man such as yourself has no reason to be jealous of a horny seventeen-year-old who is no more and couldn't get my attention with a red cape when he was. Right?"
Steve tried his best to stay angry for a minute more, but when she caught his eye and grinned, he couldn't help but laugh at his own foolishness.
"Right," he agreed laughingly, "but who said I was jealous?"
Still, Olivia noticed he was uncharacteristically quiet for the rest of the drive to the diner.