Death in a Beach Chair Read Online Free Page A

now you’re wondering if maybe it’s bothering Jerry, too?” Susan asked.
    “I saw a television show on post-traumatic stress. It can appear years and years after the event. This show was about Vietnam vets, but losing your entire family the way that Jerry did certainly could be as stressful as a war.”
    Susan didn’t respond immediately. She stared down into the water and remembered the night that Jerry had called to tell her that his wife and two daughters had died in a flaming pile of metal on the highway near Hancock. She had been nearly paralyzed with shock and grief, but Jerry had coped with his loss. He had organized the funeral, dealt with June’s family, and entertained the many friends and neighbors who had attended the funeral and then come to visit in the following weeks.
    A few months later, Jerry had accepted Susan’s offer of help, clearing the house of June’s and the children’s possessions before he put it on the market and moved into a small condo downtown near the train station. At the time, Susan had wondered at Jerry’s lack of outward emotion, but Jed, who had known Jerry since college, had claimed that this was Jerry’s way of handling things, and in all honesty, Susan had been relieved. She and June had been good friends; her children and Susan’s children had been nearly the same ages. They’d gone to school, parties, swimming lessons, and dancing lessons together. They had been inseparable at the Hancock Field Club. They had gone to Disney World on family vacations, trick-or-treated together, joined Brownies and Cub Scouts. Susan and her children were in mourning, as well.
    But time passed. An attractive professional and widower in his thirties, Jerry had been invited to numerous parties as the extra man and introduced to many potential mates, but no one had caught his eye until Susan and Jed introduced him to Kathleen, a young state police officer who had come to town to help solve a murder. Less than a year later they were married. Kathleen quit her job and they started a family. Two children later, Kathleen and Jerry seemed to be among the happiest couples Susan and Jed knew. And, more importantly, Susan claimed Kathleen among her best friends. She was having a difficult time accepting the thought that there were serious marital problems in Kathleen’s life and that she hadn’t known about them.
    “Has Jerry talked more about June or the girls recently?” Susan asked.
    “You mean since he’s seemed depressed?”
    “Exactly.”
    “No. Not that I’ve noticed. But you know what’s beginning to worry me?”
    “No, what?”
    “I’m beginning to act differently . . . and think differently about him.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “You know those annoying little habits that husbands have?”
    “Like leaving socks on the bathroom floor even though there’s a hamper less than a foot away? Or putting dirty glasses into the sink instead of bothering to open the door of the dishwasher and plopping them inside?”
    “For me it’s the toothpaste tube problem.”
    “What toothpaste tube problem?”
    “Jerry leaves the top off. Always. And when I pick it up and put it back on, there’s a little drip of toothpaste on the sink that I have to wipe up. It’s silly but it drives me nuts.”
    “Have you tried those tubes that stand up?”
    “Sure did. And they are an improvement. He doesn’t put the top on, but the toothpaste doesn’t drip out. Of course, we have a little travel tube with us here. I’ll bet anything that when I go into that bathroom, there will be a top on one side of the basin and the tube on the other. When we were first married, I thought it was sort of endearing—so help me.”
    “Well, let’s face it, during those first few months of infatuation, everything seems endearing. My own theory is that too much sex destroys your judgment, and feeling kindly toward someone who can’t remember to put the top back on the toothpaste proves it.”
    “I had gotten