Denise Swanson - Murder of a Sleeping Beauty

Skye dreamed she was in college and had forgotten to go to class all semester. Now it was time to take the final exam. A blank blue book stared up at her from the desktop. She couldn’t breathe. She struggled up through layers of unconsciousness. She still couldn’t inhale. Her mouth felt dry and fuzzy. Her eyes flew open. Everything was black. Bingo had settled on the pillow next to her, his rump covering the lower half of her face.

She pushed him away and flung back the covers. She was sweating, and it felt as if she had run the Chicago Marathon. To calm her racing heart she tried one of the deep breathing exercises she taught to kids who suffered from anxiety.

Suddenly Skye bolted upright. Shit, shit, shit! She would bet her next paycheck that the high school had no crisis-intervention strategy. She had read recently that only seventy-eight percent of all schools had such a plan, and since neither a psychologist nor social worker had ever remained in Scumble River for more than a year, it was highly unlikely an emergency procedure had ever been written. And without a plan spelling out who would do what in case of a disaster or a tragedy, nothing would be in place to handle the students’ grief.

She’d bet another week’s salary that Homer would see no need for such an intervention. But whether the principal agreed or not, many of the students would suffer severe emotional trauma once they heard about Lorelei’s death. For the majority of those kids, it would be their first taste of mortality. Most would act as if Lorelei’s death didn’t bother them, but if the situation wasn’t handled properly, they’d be vulnerable to suicide attempts, substance abuse, and other risk-taking behaviors.

Skye pulled the covers over her head. How could she deal with such a crisis alone? She needed help from other mental-health professionals, but there were none in Scumble River.

After a few moments, she forced herself out of bed and into the shower. By five-thirty, she was sitting at her kitchen table with a cup of Earl Grey tea, the phone book, and a legal pad.

One bright spot. The superintendent was out of town. Dr. Wraige and Skye had a mutual-avoidance policy going, and she was happy not to have to deal with him. That left the principal as her first call. She hoped he was an early riser.

“Hi. Homer? Skye Denison here. Time? Yes, I know the time. It’s five-thirty-five. I’m sorry I woke you, but we have a problem, one connected with Lorelei’s death.” Skye held the phone away from her ear and let him rant for a few moments. “I’m really sorry, but do we have some sort of policy on how to deal with this type of situation with the other kids?”

Homer’s end went silent. Then he said, “No. Well, we do have something from the special ed co-op, but we never filled in the blanks with names or anything.”

The Scumble River School District belonged to the Stanley County Special Education Cooperative, an entity that, in theory, furnished them with programs and personnel on an intermittent basis, as needed. The cooperative had started out by providing school psychologists, social workers, occupational therapists, physical therapists, speech pathologists, and teachers for such low-incidence handicaps as vision and hearing impairments. Now that most of those professions were needed full-time by school districts, the co-op had become more or less a watchdog to deal with the bureaucratic red tape of special-education funding.

Skye covered the mouthpiece and swore. She tapped an angry tattoo on the kitchen table with her pen, then finally spoke into the phone. “Who do we have available who’s qualified to help deal with the kids who are upset?”

“Besides you?”

“Yes, besides me.” She was glad Homer couldn’t see her expression. Forcing her tone into a pleasant range, she asked, “Who can I have today? Who will have had some training?”

A longer silence fell this time. “Ah, no one I can think of. Maybe we should call off school today and let the parents handle it.”

Skye considered Homer’s suggestion. It was tempting, but it probably wouldn’t be best for the majority of the kids to sit home and brood, or worse yet, get together in groups and egg each other on to do something stupid, to prove who loved Lorelei best.

If Lorelei had been an average student, Skye could have called together the girl’s two or three closest friends and helped them deal with their emotions. But Lorelei was a star—head cheerleader, lead in all the school musicals, majorette in the band, and secretary of the student council—so almost everyone in the school would feel her loss. Even those who were jealous of her would experience some emotion.

“No, we’d better have school today. I’ll call the co-op, and see if they have a crisis team we can borrow. And we need to have a faculty meeting before school. Quite a few teachers will be upset, too.”

“The staff will be fine,” Homer protested.

Skye contemplated crawling back into bed. Instead she continued to sweet-talk him until Homer agreed to hold a teachers’ meeting at seven-thirty. She fed Bingo and got dressed. It was still only six o’clock. She decided to try the co-op anyway and got an answering machine. She left her message and headed out the door.

It was a long walk to the school, and what with yesterday’s excitement, she had forgotten to arrange for a ride. Skye vowed she would buy a car this weekend even if she had to sell her body to get the cash. Looking down at her generous curves, she hoped the car salesman liked cuddly women.

As Skye pulled the cottage door shut, a white Oldsmobile turned into her driveway. Skye closed her eyes and prayed for strength. Her mother, May Denison, was fifty-seven but had the energy of a twenty-year-old. She kept her house immaculate, exercised four times a week, and worked part-time as a police, fire, and emergency dispatcher. Along with this already-busy schedule, May’s primary cause in life was taking care of her children. This would have been noble had Skye and her brother, Vince, been under sixteen, but both were well over thirty. Skye was finding it tough to keep her independence.

May shot out of the car and yo-yoed Skye, first grabbing her in a tight hug, then pushing her away, then grabbing her again. “Why do I always have to hear about things from Minnie first?” May demanded.

“I thought you were dispatching last night, and would already know more than I did.”

“No, I traded with Thea so she could go to her granddaughter’s dance recital. I worked days yesterday.” May crossed her arms. “Fill me in.”

Skye thought she knew what her mother was referring to, but she was taking no chance in revealing a secret that May might not actually know. “What did Aunt Minnie have to say this morning?”

“Don’t try to act dumb with me, Missy. Lorelei Ingels’s murder, of course.”

“No one has said she was murdered, have they?” Skye wondered if a cause of death had been announced while she was sleeping.

“Everyone in town knows that the police and coroner were at the school. Not that my own daughter would pick up a phone and call me.” The salt-and-pepper waves on May’s head appeared to bristle.

“Sorry, Mom. It was after nine-thirty by the time I got home.” Skye tried to look innocent, fighting a sly grin that was trying to escape. “Besides, I thought for sure Uncle Charlie would have told you.”

“Charlie knew?” A look of betrayal crossed May’s face. Charlie and May had been trading secrets and gossip for nearly thirty years.

“Sure, he was there. He drove me home.”

“Mmm.” May paused for a few moments, then continued on a different track. “That reminds me. Your father’s found a car for you.”

Skye felt her heart sink. Her dad’s idea of a great car was good transportation—paint and fenders were optional. After driving her father’s eyesores all her life, this time she wanted something with a little more beauty than the beasts he usually chose. She knew it was shallow to care about a car’s looks, but she didn’t care. This time she wanted something hot. A Miata if she could swing the payments.