Death Before Facebook

you.” He wanted to go over and take her hands, but he knew better. When she was this way, she was in a shell that she didn’t want violated. “Listen to me. You’re fine. You’re just upset and you are stressed out. But at your age, stress can’t do all that much to you.”
    “It can give you ulcers.”
    “How’s your tummy?”
    “Fine.” She actually smiled. “It’s my chest that feels funny.”
    “Dr. John says you’ve got a broken heart.”
    She laughed. “Do Dr. John.”
    Dr. John was a part he’d always played for her when she was sick; it was based partly oh the voodoo priest of the slave days, and partly on the contemporary musician, whose records Cole would play, and whose hoarse voice he’d use, when “curing” her.
    He raised his hands and made them into claws. “By lizard and snake and skull and scorpion, I lift the hurt and ease the pain.” His voice was like gravel. He got up and began to dance in a circle around Neetsie, the choreography inspired by movies whose makers had failed to research Native American culture.
    “Dr. John put a spell on you! Put the gris-gris on that hurt!” He pronounced it “hoit” like the musician, which made Neetsie laugh.
    He stretched out his arms, made V’s of his fingers, and chanted, “Anita Bonita Juanita be cured! Mojo work and gris-gris take root. Out of this girl, broken heart be lured!”
    “Daddy. It’s the only heart I’ve got.”
    “Oh. Okay.” He did the whole thing again, with the V’s and the gravelly voice. “Out of this girl, the sadness be lured.” He made the last word a big deal. And then he started to dance around some more, singing the mojo song, like he always did when he played Dr. John: “I got my mojo working, got my mojo workin’, and it sure do work on you.”
    He dropped into a squat at her feet. “Feel better?”
    She nodded, smiling, almost her normal self. “I love Dr. John. Maybe it’s why I want to be an actress.”
    “Sweetheart, I hope you can do better than that.” He picked himself up and sat in his chair again.
    “You know what that cop asked me? She came to the TOWN dinner last night.”
    Cole nodded. “I knew Pearce asked her. What did she want to know?”
    “She asked me what I liked best about Geoff. I told her about the time he woke me up for the puppies. What did you like best?”
    “When I first met him, he was just a little boy about eleven or twelve, and he came over to me and said, ‘Do you know how to play baseball and basketball?’
    “I said, ‘Sure. Why?’ But he didn’t answer, he just said, ‘How about chess?’ I said, ‘Uh-huh.’ And he said, ‘Poker?’ I don’t even remember all the things he asked, but you see what he was doing? He was checking out my daddy qualifications.
    Just when I thought it was all done, he said, ‘Well, what kind of cookies can you bake?’ I said, ‘Chocolate chip,’ and he said, ‘Uh-uh. Oatmeal,’ and went away. So I knew I was in, as long as I brought some oatmeal cookies every time I came over.”
    “And that was it? That was the best thing he ever did?”
    “Well, no. See, he used the cookies too—like, at first they’d be an excuse to stay around while he ate them. Then he’d offer me some; and then he’d say he’d play catch for a while if I’d bring him some more. You know how kids don’t want to say they like you?”
    “Boys.”
    “Okay, boys. Well, that was his way of doing it—pretending he was just in it for the cookies.”
    “Now you’re going to cry.”
    “I might.” Sure enough, his throat had gone tight, but he blinked before anything came out of his eyes.
    * * *
     
    That afternoon Skip drove home singing with the radio, knowing she was going to get a break from the case—tonight was the night she and Cindy Lou were going to see the Boucree Brothers.
    She had done quite a bit of paperwork after seeing Marguerite, and she’d left work early to do some research on the computer—since she hadn’t heard from Wizard, the sysop, she’d gotten impatient; she wanted to work on Geoff’s posts on her own.
    It was barely after three when she arrived home, but the day was cloudy and it was already getting dark. There was a nasty chill in the air.
    But Sheila was on the patio, working on something, maybe homework.
    “Hey, babe. Aren’t you cold?”
    “I’m fine.” The girl didn’t look up.
    Uh-oh, forget about work for a while.
    “Come in, why don’t you? Let’s have some cocoa.”
    “I don’t