Excerpt: Gap Year (Working Title)

Chapter1

“Why are you still here?” Veronica said as she chopped the cheese with a knife. “You've been hanging around here all day.”

“You know why,” Heidi said. “And I haven't been here all day. It's just been a few hours.”

Veronica made a few more viscous chops at the cheese and set the cutting board aside. She looked at her friend and set the knife down. Heidi was sitting in a chair on the other side of the table. “You're just avoiding the answer.”

“Guilty.” Heidi was leaning back in the chair. She picked up a cube of cheese and popped it in her mouth. “And you know why I'm here.”

“Precisely my point.” Veronica picked up the knife again and started chopping celery.
Heidi made no attempts to get a piece of celery, Veronica noted.

“And I'm not leaving until I'm ready.” Heidi smiled and quickly picked up another cube of cheese.

Veronica started cutting the tomatoes, though not as fast. She was losing some of her frustration. She knew her friend was just being a friend. But that didn't change the frustration. Once she realized that her friend was going to stay put, she started on another tomato.

Heidi looked at the clock on the wall over the kitchen sink. She was making no effort to hide what she was doing.

“It's been a rough year, hasn't it,” Heidi said.

Veronica put down the knife. She pushed the plate with the tomatoes away and rested her arms n the table. She was determined that she was not going to let her friend know how she was feeling right now.

“It has.” There was no use lying. Her friend had been with her as she was going through it. She was even sitting in that same chair when there was the knock at the door.

“And I figure this is going to be a rough time for you right now,” Heidi said. She reached over and rested a hand on Veronica's arm. “I'm going to stay here for a while, like it or not. Carol will be staying at my place until later.”

“But I'm making tacos tonight. Their her favorite.”

Carol was Veronica's six-year-old daughter.

“We'll see how it goes. Right now she's having fun with Becky and Phil. Last I heard they were putting him through a tea party. He said he was having a blast.”

They both laughed.

“Can't we go ahead and have her over now?” Veronica said. It seemed strange having to ask that in her own kitchen about her own daughter. “I know she won't want to miss tacos.”

“We'll wait.”

“How much longer?”

“As long as it takes.” Heidi picked up a cube of cheese and put it in Veronica's mouth. “You'll feel better with food in your stomach.”

“I'll feel better when you stop hovering over me.”

Veronica wondered if Heidi was watching it for the same reason she was. She was watching because she wanted to know how long her friend was going to be sitting across the table from her. Heidi was probably watching to see how long it was going to be before Veronica started to cry.

But Veronica was determined that that wasn't going to happen.

Veronica knew that the time Heidi was waiting for was five o'clock. That was the time Morris had always returned from his fishing trips. He usually returned sometime between four-thirty and five. He had never been back later that five.

Until last year.

Then he hadn't come home at all.

It was quarter to five right now.

Maybe Heidi will leave right after that. And then Carol can come back and enjoy her tacos.

“Maybe you'll feel better if you talked about it,” Heidi said.

“I've talked about it with you a lot,” Veronica said. “What difference would it make if we talked some more? What's done is done.”

“But how are you handling it?”

“I'm handling it as well as can be expected.”

Heidi smiled. “Which isn't an answer.” She put a piece of celery in her mouth. “You husband disappeared a year ago and you have never had an idea of what actually happened to him. That's not something that's easy to handle for anyone. Especially the way it happened.”

Veronica got up from the table and took the plate of cut food in. That allowed her to have her back to her friend for a few moments. Gave herself a chance to compose herself. All it took was a few deep breaths.

“The way it happened didn't make it any easier, but it was better than some of the alternatives,” Veronica said. “All we know is that he disappeared.” she leaned against the counter, arms folded, as she looked at her friend.

“Which means you have no idea what happened to him. At least if you knew it would be easier.”

“Any way you look at it, he's still gone.”

Heidi started to say something. Then stopped. She leaned back in her chair. “But you don't know why. You don't know just what happened to him.”

“I know he's not here. That he hasn't been.”

“But how you found out. The police. The search. They didn't come up with any explanation.”

“And Morris didn't provide one either.” Veronica sat back at the table. Her voice was sounding a bit more edgy than she wanted it to. She wanted Heidi to be assured at she was okay so she would leave.

“That's just it. You don't know if he was able to or not.”

Veronica picked up the knife. She tapped the point on the table. She wasn't wanting to talk about it right now, but Heidi wasn't going to stop. Heidi was right. She didn't know what happened. That had made all the difference. That's what made the last year so hard. So frustrating. She set the knife on the table.

Heidi picked up the knife and set it on the counter.

Veronica knew she was setting it out of reach. There was nothing to worry about. She wasn't that kind of a person.

“You are going to leave shortly after five, right?” Veronica asked.

“If I'm feeling you're okay.”

“I will be.”

“I'm sure you will. You're a tough one.”

“And I'm also getting hungry. For tacos.” As if in response to the statement, her stomach growled.

They both laughed.

Then they both heard the sound of a car stopping in the driveway.

“Were you expecting someone?” Heidi asked.

“No. Were you?”

“If I was, they would have come to my house. Not here.”

Heidi lived across the street.

“Maybe someone was just turning around. They are leaving,” Heidi said as they heard the sounds of a car pulling out of the driveway.

“Guess so.” Veronica relaxed. She wasn't up to company right now. She was still waiting for Heidi to leave.

“Someone's coming to the door,” Heidi said. “I can hear someone talking.”

Just as Veronica was about to say that she hoped not, the door to the kitchen opened.
“I'm home.”

“Oh, my God!” Veronica almost choked on the saliva she was about to swallow.

“That was some trick that Hank pulled on me,” Morris said. He held up a mesh sack with several fish in it and walked over to Veronica. “He left me there all by myself. I had to find someone to give me a ride hoime. He even took my camping gear.”

“What are you doing here?” Heidi asked as she stood up from the table. The chair banged against the wall behind her.

Morris gave her a puzzled look. “Coming home to my wife, that's what. What are you doing here?”

Veronica was still in her chair. “How in the...”

It couldn't be possible. He was even wearing the same clothes he had been wearing on that fishing trip last year. How many times had she recalled the picture of what he was wearing the day he had left for the trip?

Morris dropped the fish on the table in front of her, like he always did. He leaned over and gave her a kiss on the forehead.

Veronica clamped her mouth shut as the smell of the fish caught up with her. She continued to stare as he turned and opened the refrigerator.

“What happened to my ginger ale. I'm thirsty,” he said as he looked in the refigerator.

“I can't believe this,” Heidi said.

Morris closed the fridge and turned. “You girls look like you saw a ghost. You two feeling okay?”

Veronica was seeing spots before her eye. She looked away from him long enough to see that Heidi had backed against the wall on the other side of the kitchen.

“How did you get here?” Veronica's voice was only a whisper.

“I managed to hitch a ride. Like I said, Hank up and left me there.”

Veronica felt dizzy.

“Veronica!” Heidi rushed toward her.

The last thing Veronica heard before things went black was Morris asking, “What the heck?”

Veronica figured she must have been out for just a second, because just after she opened her eyes the back of her head hit something solid. It felt like the floor. Considering she was looking up to see Heidi and Morris looking at her, she decided that was the case.

“You're not supposed to be here,' she managed to say.

“Huh?”

“You're supposed to be...” She stopped herself before she finished the sentence. Things were obviously wrong. She had to be quiet. Be careful what she said.

What was Morris doing here when the hit man she hired was supposed to have killed him last year on the fishing trip?