Don't Touch Me! - 27

 

"Yes. Maybe when I fell, I hit my head? Maybe it happened in the bar?"

"If you hit it hard enough to lose that much time, you'd have had a bruise or a bump, and it would have hurt. Did you?"

"Have a headache or a bump on my head? No," Cody replied, puzzled. "Just my arms and my hands."

"The kind of thing that could have happened if you'd been in a fight?"

"If I had, I think more than my arms and hands would have sustained damage, don't you?"

"True."

Cody took a deep breath. "You think something happened and I'm repressing it, just like the shrink said."

"I think it's one possibility."

"What other reason could there be?"

"At the moment I have no clue and I won't until we figure out what happened during the missing time."

"How will we do that?"

"I could go talk to the bartender, if you know who it was. But after a year, chances are slim-to-none he'll remember anything unless it was a major incident."

"This is all a waste of time," Cody said angrily, pounding his fist on his thigh. When he grimaced, Brent laughed. "Not funny," Cody bitched.

"Is from where I'm sitting," Brent replied. "I say we take a break. It's a nice afternoon out there. Let's walk."

"You cannot be serious."

"I am. So, on your feet, my man."

Reluctantly Cody got up and they left the house. "Which way," he asked.

"It's your neighborhood. You pick the direction."

Cody turned right, trying to act casual while keeping a safe distance from Brent. He was surprised when the lady two doors down looked up from her flowerbed to call out, "It's about time you got some fresh air and sunshine." He realized it was the same neighbor he'd run into in the parking lot when he'd first discovered his phobia. She stood, wiping her hands on her jeans, and came over. "Don't worry," she said with a smile. "I'm not going to touch you. Who's your friend?"

"Brent Harding," Brent replied before Cody could. "And you are, lovely lady?"

She actually blushed. "Mrs. Grainger, and right now I wish it was Miss."

"Very nice to meet you, Ms"—Brent stressed the 'Ms'—"Grainger. You have a beautiful yard."

"Thank you. Cody, where did you find him?"

"Umm… I hired him?" When she looked aghast at him, he laughed. "He's a private detective. At one point the police thought I might have killed Mother so I engaged him to prove I didn't."

"Of course you didn't kill her, Cody, so he'd better have done a good job of showing the cops you're innocent," she said, looking at Brent.

"I did. He's off the hook," Brent told her.

"Good. I'm so sorry you had to go through that," she said to Cody. For a minute he thought she was going to touch his arm but she pulled her hand back. "Your mother and I were sort of friendly, back before your father's death. She seemed like a nice woman."

"Thank you. She was."

"Well, get on wherever you're going. I have weeds to pull. I swear, I turn around and there are more." With a mock groan, she went back to the flowerbed.

"Nice woman," Brent commented. When Cody explained she was the woman at the grocery store, Brent added, "More than nice. I'm glad I got to meet her."