Dead Ever After

pretty damn badly. I didn’t have to look in a mirror to know I was wearing my mad face. “Face-to-face,” I said, and it sounded like I was biting out the words. Too late, I had second thoughts. This was going to be painful in the extreme. Wouldn’t it be better to just let our relationship drift away—avoid having the conversation I was almost certain I could script ahead of time?
    “I can’t come tonight,” Eric said. He sounded as if he were on the moon, he was so distant. “There are people in line to see me, much to be done.”
    And still his voice was empty. I let my anger rip, in that sudden way I have when I’m tense. “So we take second place. You could at least sound sorry,” I said, each word distinct and bitter.
    “You have no idea how I feel,” he said. “Tomorrow night.” And he hung up.
    “Well, fuck him and the horse he rode in on,” I said.
    After gearing up for a marathon conversation, Eric’s quick cutoff left me overflowing with restless energy.
    “This is no good,” I told the silent house. I turned on the radio and I started dancing. That is something I can do, though at the moment my skill was not important. It was the activity that counted. I threw myself into it. I thought, Maybe Tara and I can do a dance exercise program together. She and I had done routines together all through high school, and it would be easy for Tara to get back in shape that way (not that I needed to bring that up when I asked her). To my dismay, I was huffing and puffing after less than ten minutes, a not-so-subtle reminder that I myself could use a regular exercise program. I drove myself to continue for fifteen more minutes.
    When I collapsed onto the couch, I felt relaxed, exhausted, and just about in need of another shower. As I sprawled there, taking deep breaths, I noticed my answering machine was blinking. In fact, it was blinking frequently. I had more than one message. I hadn’t checked my e-mail in days, either. Plus, I’d gotten that call on my cell phone while I’d been in the shower. I had to reconnect with the world.
    First, the answering machine. After the first beep, I heard a hang-up. I didn’t recognize the number. Then a call from Tara to tell me she thought baby Sara had allergies. Then a request to take an important survey. It wasn’t too surprising that amid all this exciting communication, I began to think about the lawsuit again.
    Jane Bodehouse loved wrestling. Maybe if I called the only wrestler I knew, a guy named T-Rex, I could get her some ringside tickets. She’d be so happy she’d drop her lawsuit against Merlotte’s . . . if she was even aware of it.
    And there I was, back to worrying.
    After my phone messages, I checked my e-mails. Most of them suggested I enlarge my nonexistent penis or help desperate lawyers get huge sums of money out of Africa, but one was from my godfather, Desmond Cataliades, the mostly demon lawyer who had (in my view) given me the bane of my existence when he “gifted” me with telepathy. In his view, he’d endowed me with a priceless advantage over other humans. I’d received this birth present because I was the granddaughter of Mr. Cataliades’s great friend Fintan and Fintan’s, well, his girlfriend—my grandmother, Adele Stackhouse. Not only was I a descendant of a fairy, I possessed the “essential spark.” Whatever that was. And that was why I’d been lucky enough to manifest the telepathy.
    Mr. Cataliades wrote:
    Dearest Sookie, I am back in New Orleans, having settled my issues with the local supernatural community and done some essential detective work. I hope to visit you very soon to verify your well-being and to give you some information. I hear rumors of what is happening in your life, and those rumors disturb me.
    Me, too, Mr. C. Me, too. I responded by telling him that I was doing okay and that I’d be glad to see him. I wasn’t sure if any of that was true, but it sounded good.
    Michele, Jason’s fiancée, had e-mailed me two days ago from her job at the car dealership.
    Hi Sookie! Let’s get a pedicure together tomorrow! I have the morning off. What about nine o’clock at Rumpty?
    I’d had only one pedicure before, but I’d enjoyed it, and I liked Michele fine; but we didn’t necessarily have the same idea about what constituted a good time. However, she was going to be my sister-in-law soon, and I sent back an abject apology for not checking my e-mail sooner.
    Tara had sent me a message.
    Hey