APPLE ROAD: THE CIDER CELLAR DISCOTHEQUE

"So tell me," special agent Mavis Taylor handed her partner Dill Murphy a tray of coffee before getting into the car, "What do you make of our Nancy Drew? Should we arrest her, take her into protective custody or recruit her?"

Twice a week, like clockwork, Cherie Solange showed up at the main library. She read everything available about serial murder. She scoured the newspapers of all the major cities to keep up with developments. She found out that the FBI was looking for a killer who had an Apple Road connection as well as a Hollywood connection. The killer had access to a stretch limousine. His nicknames were as scattered as his victims. A headline in Los Angeles read, "Stretch Strikes Again". On the east coast it was, "Johnny Appleseed Plants Another One".

"She's guilty of something," Dill said with his mouth full.

"What?" Mavis kept her eyes on the library building.

"Boring me to death. Ruining my Saturday nights," Dill inspected his sandwich.

"For someone who collects so much information, she never tries to inject herself...." Mavis stopped short. Cherie Solange exited the library but she wasn't wearing the same clothes she had on when she had entered the library. The skimpy lavender dress was so light that it looked like the evening breeze might blow it off her. She wore gold high heeled sandals that changed her gait.

"I take back what I said," Dill's eyes bugged out.

They followed her to the Cider Cellar Discotheque. She disappeared inside. A limousine pulled up. Gottfried got out and limped around to open the door for Jarvis Heidelbeere and his beautiful date.

"Do you think she's looking to get killed?" Dill asked his partner.

"Maybe she's got disco fever," Mavis shrugged. She had no idea what was wrong with Cherie. It was probably more than one thing.

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: L.A. WOMAN

He used binoculars to watch her leave her tiny studio apartment on West Riverside Drive. She walked towards the freeway overpass where she would get in line for The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson as she did every Friday afternoon. As usual, she was dressed to impress, hoping that she would catch Johnny's eye and get discovered.

When she arrived at the entrance to the 134 Freeway overpass, he started the engine and drove to the center of the overpass and got out of the limo. He walked towards her carrying a single rose, an envelope embossed with the letters "VIP Pass" and an empty champagne glass.

"Mr. Carson graciously requests your presence at a pre-show party at an undisclosed restaurant across the street from the studio," the limo driver smiled.

She wanted to believe it was really happening. By the time she realized she was being abducted, it was too late.

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: A HOLLYWOOD BUNGALOW

"Gas masks?" Agent Mavis Taylor raised her eyebrows.

"What's in there?" Agent Dillard Murphy asked.

"It's not in the house. It's in the pool," Police Sergeant Alder handed them masks and put on his own and motioned for them to follow him on the stone path to the back yard.

"Gas masks?" Agent Taylor repeated.

"We don't know what we are dealing with and we've been having a vomitous situation with law enforcement officers contaminating the scene with unprecedented volumes of vomit," Sergeant Alder opened the side yard gate. They ran into a man wearing scuba gear who walked past them quickly shaking his head no.

"You can't dive into that thing. That is not a swimming pool anymore. You throw something on top of it, it doesn't sink," the man suddenly began gagging and vomiting, resting one hand on the side of the house to steady himself. He'd been in such a hurry to get out of the backyard that he didn't bother to take off his scuba gear. 

When the trio arrived at the pool area they noted the vomit filled scuba mask that had been abandoned. Nearby was an upside down life saving pole sticking out of the pool like a candle on a very disgusting birthday cake.

"Alright. Let's check out the house and get a hazard team out here to find out what this is," Murphy threw up his arms. He and Taylor did an about face and hurried into the bungalow.

The bungalow belonged to Oscar-winning actress Angie Richards. Back in the day she had been a stunner. Her career was cut short when alcohol got the best of her.

"Let's check this out," Murphy found a name that appeared frequently in Angie's checkbook and arranged a meeting with the woman.

* * * *

"I was her personal assistant up until a month or so after she won the Oscar," Doreen told the FBI agents.

"We noticed her Oscar was not on display at her bungalow. Would you happen to know where she kept it?" Agent Taylor asked her.

"She didn't get to keep it. That was part of the deal," Doreen replied.

"What deal was that?" Agent Taylor asked.

"If she won the Oscar and accepted it without falling off the stage, delivering a drunken speech about Native American Indians, the actors and politicians she had slept with or any other controversy, then Dr. Bramley got to keep the Oscar for services rendered." Doreen explained.

"Dr. Walter Bramley, the psychiatrist?" Taylor asked.

"Yeah, I think that was his name." Doreen nodded.

Taylor and Murphy returned to the bungalow to see what kind of progress was being made on the pool situation.

"Do you think Angie Richards is at the bottom of that pool?" Sergeant Alder asked the agents.

"God only knows. In the meantime Agent Taylor and I are going back to Appleblossom to re-interview someone who might know," Agent Murphy answered as he took a parting look at the pool. The backyard had become like an archaeological excavation site. There was an eerie atmosphere that reminded Taylor of that movie that had just come out, CLOSE ENCOUNTERS OF THE THIRD KIND." She half-expected an alien life form to come out of that pool.

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: THE RAIN SONG | BURNING ALIVE IN HELL

For two and a half months the FBI searched for the torso of Jane Doe One. They never found it. They interviewed almost everyone in the township of Appleblossom and went as far north as the unincorporated hamlet of Lonesome Lake where they located a person of interest with a Hollywood connection, Theodore Embry. Embry was a cousin of a summer blockbuster big wig in Tinsel Town. His could-be-fabulous chalet on the lake was a study in squalor but that wasn't against the law and there was no evidence of foul play.

By April there was only a skeleton crew left behind in Appleblossom. Everyone else was reassigned to the new location in Toluca Lake, California.

No one at Ray Moon's Market and Service Station was considered a person of interest. Ben Baker would have made the list if they could see him now in his trailer on the edge of the apple orchard of St Anthony's Abbey. The snow had melted and the heaviest rains ever came. It was 10:00 in the morning on his day off but he couldn't go trout fishing from his favorite spot on the Apple Road Bridge, so he went to the refrigerator for another six pack of beer. He didn't get up for "a" beer. He grabbed six at a time. He took long drags on his bong and sat around in what passed for his pajamas these days, the uniform shirt stained with the blood of Cherie Solange.

Cherie was in the back office taking orders from Stan Stills, the society page writer. She was fetching stock photos for the piece about the upcoming annual Easter Egg hunt at the abbey. The doctors said she could return to her delivery job but Sam Masterson wanted her to wait one more month. Sam still believed Cherie aspired to be a writer and that she'd been taking writing classes. Craig and Skipper snickered between themselves that it must be hard for her to write with nun-chucks. They kept it as an inside joke between the two of them.

Craig and Skipper were donning their slickers and galoshes.
Skipper walked over to Tina's desk and leaned in towards her to show her he was dead serious. She was looking out her window at the cars in the parking lot. The rain was so heavy that it distorted shapes and made lights crawl like shadows on the wet pavement.

"I mean it, don't call me Skipper anymore. Call me Richard. I'm going back to my given name now. Seriously, Tina is that too much to ask," he noticed her jaw dropped and the blood left her face.

"It's not that big a deal," he frowned. 

Tina stood up like a zombie and looked right through Skipper and let out a high pitched scream. She ran towards the front door. Just as the door squeaked open, she leap upon the him and wrapped her legs around his waist tight.

"Hey, Tina," His voice was horse and deeper than they remembered. Lewis slid her off him gently like hot wax gliding down a candle. He gave nods of recognition to Craig and Skipper. They didn't expect to see him until Christmas, if then.

"Dude," Craig nodded back to his big brother. Lewis didn't look like himself. His face was gaunt and it looked like he hadn't shaved in a week. He'd lost a lot of weight. He was wearing a leather jacket and a white tee shirt that was soaking wet.

"Is Cherie here?" he asked.

"She's in the back office working with Stan," Craig gave his brother a side hug.

"I'll catch up with you tonight, man," Lewis put one arm around Craig, squeezed tight and tugged him in for a quick rib cage bump.

He stopped in front of the glass wall of back office. Her back was to him. She was fishing for something in a file cabinet. He'd never seen her with her hair down. She always wore the braided ponytail. Since she was grounded from jogging, martial arts, her paper route and anything strenuous until her injuries healed, she let her hair hang. It was like a caramel waterfall with flashes of gold and red when it caught the light. Craig called her "Cousin Itt" from the Addam's Family. She had to whip her head to swish it away from her butt every time she sat down so she wouldn't sit on it. 

Cherie felt eyes upon her and turned around. He opened the glass door and walked towards her.

"Cherie, get your things. I have to talk to you," Lewis choked the words out plaintively. He looked like a man in mourning, completely broken in two. A tear rolled down his cheek.

She hesitated. The sound of a toilet flushing broke the silence.

"Come on, baby, don't make me cry in front of Stills," he begged her. Something in her snapped. She put the file Mr. Stills asked for on top of the cabinet, grabbed her purse and threw her coat over her arm instead of stopping to put it on. coat He took other her arm. The file folder slid off the cabinet and the photos fanned out on the floor like the feathers of a peacock in heat. They didn't look back. 

Stan Stills came out of the restroom and hydroplaned on the photographs, breaking his fall by grabbing the chair from the cartoon drafting table. It was on wheels so he ran with it, knocking over things in his path until the chair hit the wall. 

"Mother Of God!" He shouted after he regained his balance. He bolted out into the front office to find out what was going on.

"Did she ask if she could leave?" Tina was trying to trade outrage for tears.

"Nobody said anything to me," Stills rubbed a patch of fog off the window. "I see! The Battling Burtons are at it again!" 

Indeed, at first it seemed like Cherie and Lewis were at each other's throats in the parking lot in the pouring rain. Cherie's arms were gesturing so much she dropped her coat and purse in a mud puddle. Lewis kept slapping his heart like a love-sick gorilla. When she started to bend down to pick up her things he stopped her and brought her back up and pulled her in for a kiss that lasted so long that Tina couldn't take it anymore. 

"For God's sake!" She stormed off to the restroom.

"Watch out for the shit on the floor, Tina! I almost broke my damn neck," Stills called out but didn't budge from the window. With Tina gone the men could openly stare at the scene.

"Yep, Burton and Taylor are an item again," Stills shook his head.

"Do they even know it's raining? Man, that's some heavy shit," Craig stood there almost unrecognizable and completely covered in his rain gear. 

"You're too young to be watching this, Craig. You should be home watching Shari Lewis and Lamb Chop," Stills ribbed the wide-eyed innocent kid. 

"Huh?" Craig didn't get it.

"Lamb Chop, the sock puppet? Yeah, before your time, kid. Sorry about that. I keep forgetting how damn old I am," Stills sighed. From then on his nickname for Craig was Lamb Chop.

Stan didn't mess with Skipper or Tina. They were both burning alive in the hell of unrequited love and no longer had a sense of humor between the two of them.

"Come on man, we've got deliveries to make, remember," Skipper sighed when the show was over. Cherie and Lewis took off in the tiny green sports car.

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: NO SATISFACTION

"I can assure you, Agent Lagery, that any judgement call made by my staff was made in the best interest of everyone concerned and frankly, I find these questions insulting. Now, if you don't mind, I have meeting I need to get to," hospital administrator, Robert Dockery complained.

"I didn't ask you how you feel. I don't give a rat's ass how you feel. I asked you who authorized the removal of two security guards from Ehbo's room?" Frank Lagery was about to lose his cool.

"If you'd been listening to me instead of trying to throw your weight around here you would have realized by now that in our profession judgement calls are made all the time on an as needed basis. As I already mentioned, at 3:30 in the morning a belligerent alcoholic entered the emergency room and staff requested additional security because the last time this individual came to our facility, which he often does, there was some property damage. For one thing, on the previous occasion a brand new IBM Selectric typewriter was knocked off it's stand and badly damaged. Mr. Ehbo, as you refer to him, had not damaged any property and you yourself said he was no longer considered a risk to himself or others. He wasn't going to hurt anyone and furthermore, at that hour he was sound asleep. We assigned a nurse who was more than qualified to babysit, she was in fact overqualified..." the administrator showed no sign of letting up.

"Shut the fuck up! Scotty, take his fingerprints. I'm going down to the ER and see if I can get the name of the person who ordered the changing of the guard," Agent Lagery was almost out the door when the administrator mouthed off again.

"You most certainly are not taking my fingerprints. That request will have to be submitted to the board of directors at the meeting next month for consideration and you will be advised in writing of their decision," the administrator said dryly.

Lagerly exploded and hurled towards the man like a guided missile, sliding across the administrator's desk and grabbing him by his tie. He pulled the tie until they were nose to nose.

"You ignorant, arrogant, asshole. Those guards were assigned protect that boy. He's dead because of you and your people. You're lucky he doesn't appear to have any family. If he did, they would sue your ass off. By the way, when you get home, if that serial killer is sitting on your living room couch, don't call the police and don't call us, call your babysitter," Lagerly let go of the man's tie and left the room.

"Good cop, bad cop. You are obviously the good cop, eh?" the hospital administrator started in on Agent Scotty Uzer.

"Not tonight. We don't have time for this shit. Mr. Robert Dockery, you have the right to remain silent...." Agent Uzer read him his rights and had him carted away.

Agent Mavis Taylor took the fingerprints of the cleaning lady. Lilly-May Parker was sobbing uncontrollably. She was the last person who saw Ehbo alive other than the person who killed him.

"Miss Parker, I want you to tell me everything you remember about tonight, even if it doesn't seem important at all. Just tell me everything you remember while it is still fresh on your mind," Mavis said in a soothing tone of voice.

"I was in his room off and on all night. I changed his bedding many times. He had accidents. He would have done better if his nurse had time to teach him. He seemed to like the attention when people showed him new things. His nurse was too busy and she kept saying she was supposed to be home, that this was overtime. So I just kept changing the bedding."

"Miss Parker, where did you put the soiled linen?" Mavis asked.

"There is bin in the room. It's still there. I haven't had time to empty it yet," Lily-Mae confessed.

"That's a good thing. We need those linens. You have no idea how much you are helping us." Mavis stuck her head into the room where Agent Dill Murphy was guarding the body.

"Dill, we're gonna need that laundry basket as well as the bedding the boy is currently at rest upon. They may contain evidence of poison or lethal medications." Mavis said to him and then returned her attention to Lily-Mae.

"Please continue. What else do you remember. Did the guards say anything that sticks in your memory, Lily-Mae?" Mavis put her hand on Lily-Mae's hand to comfort her.

"I thought it was awful the way they laughed at him. In a way I was glad when they left. They were making jokes at his expense. They made fun of the way he spoke. I didn't think it was funny. I didn't say anything to them about it but I did tell the boy not to listen to them." Lily-Mae looked ashamed.

"What kind of jokes did they make? What did they say?" Mavis coaxed Lily-Mae.

"One of them said to the other, 'Why are we here? The only thing that boy is a danger to is a sandwich!' That is the type of thing they kept saying. They wanted to go. They didn't want to watch him. They became rude and said they are not baby sitters. The nurse who replaced them was also very upset. She wanted to go home. Her shift was over. She didn't want to watch the boy. She stayed, but she kept finding other things to do that she said she might as well do since she was stuck here. That is when she asked me to watch the boy. I think she was trying to find someone to transfer him to the psychiatric ward. I was happy to watch him. He was a sweet boy, so grateful for any little thing you gave him. I had a candy in my apron. I gave it to him and he rested his face on my hand like I am his best friend."

"You said he passed away while you were in the restroom attached to his room. Did you hear anything, anything at all, Lily-Mae, while you were in that bathroom?" Mavis squeezed her hand softly.

"God have mercy on my soul! It's my fault that boy is dead," Lily-Mae lowered her head and closed her eyes tight.

"What did you hear? Tell me what you heard, Miss Parker." Mavis knew in her gut that this woman knew something.

Miss Parker had seen Dr. Walter Bramley coming towards the room. She saw his distorted reflection in the curved hallway safety mirror. She didn't like him. He was only kind to wealthy people who could afford his fancy marathons at his lodge. He was horrible to people like her. He could ruin your life if he was in a bad mood and you caught his eye.

Lily-Mae didn't leave Ehbo because she had to use the restroom. She ran to hide in the restroom. She didn't have time to close the bathroom door because he would have heard it click. She hid in the darkness behind the door. He could not see her but she saw him kill Ehbo. 

"Miss Parker? Miss Parker? What did you hear when you were in that bathroom?" Mavis urged her to answer.

"I heard footsteps. When I came out of the bathroom no one was there.  Whoever it was had gone away." Parker finally answered. She prayed she made the right decision. She decided that it wouldn't bring Ehbo back and it would put her and her family at risk. She made up her mind to lie.

Mavis dismissed Miss Parker for the time being and joined Agent Dill Murphy in the room guarding Ehbo's body. She walked round and round the room, in and out of the bathroom, turning the lights off and on. She stood by the bed and looked out into the hallway at the curved mirror.

"You don't beg God to have mercy on your soul because you had to go to the bathroom and something bad happened that wasn't your fault while you were gone." Agent Mavis Taylor said to Agent Dill Murphy.

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: RIP EHBO EEE

"Exposure my ass!" FBI section chief Thomas Gra hung up the phone politely enough but swore out loud afterwards. It was obvious to him that the young man did not die from exposure. Gra was furious. He liked the gentle kid who had managed to survive against all odds with absolutely everything going against him. Everything except Cherie Solange. She had damn near killed herself trying not to run over Ehbo. 

"Sir?" Agent Joy Pruitt had been sent to Gra's make shift field office. The door was open. Agents Fletcher Sarras, Dill Murphy, Scotty Uzer, Mavis Taylor and Frank Lagery stumbled in after her nursing steaming paper cups of coffee. None of them had gotten any sleep. All they knew at this point was that there had been another murder.

"Twenty minutes ago Ehbo Eee was murdered in his bed. Pruitt, I want you to interview Cherie Solange again. She knows something," Gra tapped the photo of Cherie that was tacked to his bulletin board next to a photo of Ehbo, the new Jane Doe's head and everyone else who was on the scene at the rest stop the night before.

"Yes, sir," Pruitt nodded and began studying the photos on the board.

"I want the rest of you to get the hell on out of here and take that hospital apart. Interview everyone who was in that hospital or anywhere in the vicinity of that hospital last night. Detective Dorsey is with Ehbo's body now. Secure and transfer the body immediately. Agent Dill Murphy, you are to stay with said body until the transport is completed. Someone murdered that young man. I want to know how that happened. I do not want to hear that he's been cremated or misplaced." Chief Gra stood back and waited for one of them to say something.

"That coat," Agent Taylor's jaw dropped.

"Damn straight that God-awful coat!" Gra knew Taylor would be the first to see it. Ehbo was taken in wearing a coat that was evidence in a case that had gone cold.

"Wait a minute. That torso with the coat belongs to the cold case head? Where was I when this happened?" Agent Dill Murphy fired in disbelief.

"If we had the coat, how in the hell did that kid get a hold of it?" Agent Fletcher Sarras asked at the same time as Murphy and Uzer.

"When did we get the torso?" Uzer blurted.

"When did we get these photos!" Taylor pointed at the blow ups of the Polaroids that Cherie Solange had anonymously mailed to the authorities.

"We don't have the cold case torso. The torso we have is fresh. We do have confirmation that the same weapon was used in both decapitations, so our cold case is hot again. We've had the coat since last night. The photos were given to us by Homicide Detective Dennis Dorsey who received them from an anonymous source via the US Postal Service. Agents Brown, Le Teil and Braisse are in the field now with flashlights searching for the torso. They are using the rest stop as a temporary command post. The head we found in the San Andres Forest north of Los Angeles goes with the torso we are looking for here today east of the Mississippi. That my friends is too much space. Find out who sent those photos but first secure Ehbo's body. The person who wanted him dead no doubt wants him gone and that's not going to happen. Ehbo knows who killed both Jane Does and he's going to tell us because we are going to protect him a hell of a lot better than whoever was supposed to be protecting him last night."

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: THE DEATH OF DAVID BRAMLEY

The public was advised that the man in custody was not the serial killer and the public should still exercise reasonable caution. They called him Ehbo because that is what he called himself and it didn't take long to figure out "Eee" meant "Eat". Ehbo wanted to eat and that was pretty much all he cared about. He was docile. He was no longer a suspect. 

Ehbo was a victim of long term abuse and neglect, yet his demeanor suggested someone had loved him, fed him, led him by the arm and kept him from running to traffic. There was no way he could survive on his own. The head he was keeping in the newspaper stand probably belonged to a fellow victim, probably the one who had looked after him. Ehbo was probably hoping the head would magically come back to life and start taking care of him again.

The forest ranger had another name for the picnic raiding pair, "Yogi Bear and Boo-Boo". Ranger John Reznik had not actually seen them but had received multiple complaints from hikers and tourists about their food being stolen. They knew it wasn't an animal. The footprints were human. Sandwiches disappeared but the picnic baskets where left where they found them. 

The reports of stolen food dwindled. That was probably when the woman was murdered and Ehbo was left on his own. The coat Ehbo was wearing did not belong to the woman he was traveling with.

Dr. Walter Bramley walked down the empty hospital hallway. He came and went unnoticed because of his status at the facility. The next time when he reminded his wife that their son was dead, he would be telling the truth. It was a pity he had to do what he just did. 

When Marina escaped with David in tow, Dr. Bramley couldn't very well call the police. He would not be able to explain away the older scars. He'd done things to them that would cost him his medical license. No one needed to know that Ebho Eee was David Bramley. Marina certainly would never be identified. 

Dr. Bramley spent a reasonable amount of time looking for them and then gave up before he attracted suspicion. He avoided panic and compartmentalized the little breach by fantasizing that perhaps Marina found her way to some sleepy village in Mexico where she and David could live out their ridiculous little lives. She would be satisfied with escape. She wouldn't dare go to the authorities. Marina knew what he was capable of, but as it was now, he wished that whoever had killed Marina had bothered to kill Davy as well so he didn't have to get his hands dirty. 

The medication caused heart failure and it would be assumed Ehbo's death was due to long term exposure to the elements.

Bramley regreted that plucky Cherie Solange was staying at a different hospital where he didn't have rights to practice. Boy would he like to pay that young lady a visit.

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: THE REST STOP

Several months after Lewis left, the decomposed torso of a young woman was found near Fat Rock Creek by hikers.

Cherie found solace from all the stress by following a strict routine. When the snow melted she began jogging the three miles to work and back every day. Running was the national craze, so no one thought anything of it. Cherie's reason for running was the desire to feel safe. If it was her fate to be chased by a serial killer, she damn sure would have the stamina to out run the bastard.

On her days off, after her morning run, she drove down to the big city and spent the day doing research at the main library. There was only one way to prove Lewis was not the killer and that was to prove who the killer was.  

Once a week she attended a course at the community college. She told Skipper she was taking creative writing courses but he and Craig found out by accident that she was actually taking advance martial arts classes. They stopped by the college to surprise her one night and no one in the creative writing department ever heard of her. Her car was in the parking lot so they waited for break time. She got a coffee, had a smoke and they followed her back to her next class. 

She bowed and the proceeded to beat the crap out of some poor guy. No one wanted to be her partner after that. No one wanted it as bad as she did. She even copied the way Bruce Lee quaked at times and made terrifying sounds. Craig swore that the noises she made were cracking his ribs.

"She must be afraid of getting mugged or something," Craig guessed.

"A lot of girls take self-defense classes because of that serial killer never being caught," Skipper shrugged.

"They don't go for black belts. She's a black belt. There aren't any other girls in that class. She's the only girl," Craig's jaw dropped. "Let's get out of here before she sees us and kicks our asses for spying on her."

The next day when Craig and Skipper returned from their routes they found Tina massaging Cherie's shoulders.

"Your shoulders are like steel! Man, you are tense!" Tina exclaimed and then explained to Craig and Skipper that Cherie had come back from her route early, looking like she'd seen a ghost.

"I don't like that rest stop. I think somebody lives there!" Cherie frowned.

"Then make a report at the Ranger's Station when you make your delivery tomorrow. They'll check it out." Tina assured her.

"I think we should stop delivering to the rest stop," Cherie said.

"The box is always empty. Somebody is taking the paper every day," Craig said.

"Yeah, but we don't know what they are doing with it. I don't think we have a bunch of avid readers out there," Cherie said ominously. The Apple Press was a free paper. The paper stand was never locked. The money came from ads. For all they knew somebody was using it for toilet paper or kindling.

"They say that area is haunted!" Skipper laughed.

"Very funny, Skipper. There's one more detail. Whoever it was stole the sourdough bread the monks asked me to bring down to Ray Moon's Market. I was shaking so bad I could hardly start the truck. I didn't finish the route. I came straight back here." Cherie wasn't laughing.

"O.K." Tina picked up the phone, "I'm calling the sheriff."

It turned out that someone was piling up the papers and making a nest in the men's room. The sheriff also found pieces of sourdough bread in the newspaper nest. They padlocked the rest stop and The Apple Press canceled the paper delivery there until further notice.

The next morning on her route she drove slowly past the padlocked rest stop and noticed something odd about the Apple Press paper box. She was squinting to try to make out what it was and by the time she noticed someone was standing in the middle of the road it was almost too late. She almost hit him but swerved off the road just in time. She almost maneuvered her way back onto the road but hit a patch that was too narrow and went over the edge down into the ravine. She was alright but the truck was going to have to be towed.

Horror shook her as it sank in what the man had been wearing. He was naked except for the woman's burgundy coat with the fur trimmed hood. The coat was much too small for him and it was badly stained and torn but unmistakable. It was definitely the coat she had seen in the Polaroid prints she'd found in the roll-top desk.

The moment had been surreal. Everything seemed to be going in slow motion and yet at the same time happening very fast.

She could hear the water of Fat Rock Creek gurgling at the bottom of the ravine. The truck was pinned from falling further by two very large pine trees. She crawled out of the truck window with her purse of coins for the pay phone. She was sore but apparently nothing was broken. Her plan was to get to the phone booth at the rest stop and call the sheriff. So far the man was not in sight. 

When she reached the road she was shocked to find he was still standing in the same place. The young man just stood there in the middle of Apple Road like a lawn flamingo. She staggered across the road, never breaking eye contact with the him. She made it to the phone booth and he was still just standing there in the middle of the road. She didn't dare yell at him to get out of the road before he got hit by a car because that would probably break his trance and make him attack her. She was relieved when the man began to inch towards where the truck had vanished. He was interested in the truck, not her. Cherie lost sight of him as he scooted down to the truck.

Ehbo rummaged around until he found Cherie's brown bag lunch. He sat on top of the sideways truck and enjoyed her egg salad sandwich. There was nothing else to eat, so he climbed back up to Apple Road. 

The Sheriff was on the way. The half-naked man in the dead girl's coat started walking towards Cherie. She bolted without looking where she was going and ran right into the Apple Press paper box. She hit it hard enough to bruise her hip and jar the door open and out fell a woman's head that had been nestled in newspaper. The young man rushed across the road to pick it up and placed it back in the paper stand.

"Ehbo eee! Ehbo eee!" the young man in the dead woman's coat tried very hard to tell Cherie something.

Four sheriff cars, four ambulances and two fire trucks arrived. The young man was handcuffed and put in the first ambulance and started on an IV. He wasn't combative. He just kept saying, "Ehbo eee!"

"The suspect is incoherent, suffering from hypothermia, dehydration, multiple cuts, contusions, possible concussion," a paramedic began reel off the laundry list of things that were wrong with this man.

Cherie couldn't talk anymore. She suddenly lost her hearing and felt very sleepy. She pointed towards the paper stand.

"Christ!" the officer who opened the box exclaimed.

"What did he hit you with? Young lady, can you tell me what he hit you with?" a paramedic was suddenly hovering and working to revive her. She had no memory of being put on the stretcher.

"He didn't hit me," Cherie came to for a moment and managed to say.

"What's your name?" the paramedic asked.

"Cherie."

"Cherie, you need to tell us what he hit you with. We need to know what you were hit with," the paramedic kept at her.

"Skipper rabbit," she said. She didn't know her head was bleeding. It felt very warm and wet.

"He hit you with a rabbit?" The paramedic repeated her words and looked up at his partner. They couldn't see the truck across the road in the ravine from where they were standing. They would eventually get the story straight, but not from Cherie.

"Skipper rabbit. That head does not go with that coat," Cherie said and blacked out again.

"Deep scalp laceration. She's got a concussion. She's incoherent," the paramedic rattled off her statistics while loading her into the ambulance.

"What the fuck happened out here? 'Ehbo eee.' 'Skipper Rabbit.' Nobody is making any sense," the officer in charge threw up his hands and started talking to himself, "A lot of damn good it did to padlock this rest stop!"

"There's a truck down here!" a distant voice announced.

Within hours rumors were flying that the serial killer had been captured and that Cherie Solange had kicked his ass like Bruce Lee and knocked him back to the stone age.

Sam Masterson, Craig, Tina and Skipper sat in the waiting room until they were allowed to visit Cherie in her hospital room.

"What did the FBI ask you?" Craig ask her.

"They wanted to know what 'Skipper Rabbit' meant so I explained to them that it is a code word from my driving instructor for 'drive safely and don't run off the road'," Cherie tried to sit up but couldn't.

"Let me help you," Sam Masterson cranked the handle on her bed so she was sitting up right. 

"You ran the truck off the road, Cherie. You totaled it." Skipper reminded her.

"I know that, Skipper. That was a human being in the middle of the road, not one of your 'Skipper Squirrels'. I remembered everything you taught me and did the opposite of what you said," she managed a smile.

Cherie didn't tell the FBI what she meant about the burgundy coat that the paramedics reported she had been babbling about. They would make the connection without her help. She didn't want to get in any deeper than she was. She claimed she didn't remember rambling on about the coat, that she must have been dreaming about the terrifying ordeal and just talking out of her head about how the coat didn't fit him and certainly didn't cover the essentials.

"Who's Lewis?" the FBI agent threw in. 

"A guy I dated once. We broke up," Cherie was completely caught off guard. Apparently she had been asking for Lewis in her sleep. Truth be told, she did wish Lewis was around. No one knew where he was.

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: B.C.

Five years "B.C.", which was Apple Press jargon for "Before Cherie", Dr. Walter Bramley used to bring his family up to his log cabin estate on North Apple Road on weekends and holidays. He and his wife Gloria had one son. David was turned nine the day Dr. Bramley told his wife that he had died.

"It's your fault, Gloria. Your frigidity killed our boy. I've done everything I could to help both of you but it has come to this. Your game of withholding yourself from me caused him to be born fragile. He lost his will to survive and passed in his sleep last night, my dear. He's to be buried after Mass at the priory tomorrow. They've taken him already. Edison is going to drive you to the town house. I want you out of my sight. I just might kill you with my bare hands if you don't go now. I think we both could use some space." Dr. Bramley hissed to his heavily medicated wife. Edison had already loaded Mrs. Bramley's suitcases in the limo.

"Marina," Gloria managed to murmur.

"Marina will be staying here with me. After all, I need someone to take care of me. In the meantime, Edison will look after you. He has your medication schedule. I'll check in on you in due time," Dr. Bramley dismissed his wife.

"Get this monster out of my sight, Edison," Bramley pushed the wheel chair towards his man servant.

Of course, none of what Dr. Bramley told his wife was true. Their son was not dead yet. He was in the pool house with Marina. Marina was fourteen when she was purchased by the Bramleys at a very good price when they drove their recreational vehicle to Mexico on a family vacation several years ago. He wanted Gloria out of his way while he remodeled the estate. He was giddy about the changes he was making and didn't want her sullen face to bring him down. The isolation of being locked in her room in their townhouse for a few months might loosen her up.

The new practice he was opening was inspired by the monastery several miles up the road from his estate. For a fee the monks rented out tiny wooden shacks and provided retreats consisting of a schedule of prayers, chores and meager meals designed to restore balance in the lives of lost souls. Bramley's version of a healing retreat included medications, severe sleep deprivation, fasting and sessions in a sauna and hot tub. 

The towering cement wall around his compound was also something the monks didn't have. He justified it by telling himself he didn't want his wealthy patients mauled by bears but the real reason was that from his experiments he knew that sleep deprivation was a powerful tool that could render a person to think there was nothing wrong with running down the road butt naked and administering bizarre soliloquies to strangers who would feel compelled to report them to the authorities. This stage of treatment was something that should not be observed by the general public.

Five years ago, when David was nine years old was also the time when Dr. Bramley started stocking up on medical supplies so that he could tend injuries that occurred to his patients during the marathon treatments without having to resort to clinics and emergency rooms that might be unduly alarmed by what they saw.

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: SHERRY, SHERRY BABY, CAN YOU COME OUT TONIGHT

He brought her coffee and toast in the morning. They ate in bed. Lewis frowned the whole time.

"What?" Cherie ventured.

"I'm going to do the right thing but my dad is going to take it wrong," Lewis revealed his plan. "I'm going to take your route until your hand is well enough to grip the wheel without springing a leak. The road is treacherous this time of year. The truck has snow tires and you got your chains but what if something darts in the road and you lose control because your grip is weak?"

"Skipper already gave me the rabbit speech. Never jerk the wheel to avoid a rabbit. Never swerve because of a cute little God damned squirrel. Develop a heart of stone. Feel that little skull pop under your tire and stay the course. Otherwise you could die alone in a ditch or maybe take a bus load of school children with you. Pull over when it's safe and cry for the little rodents if you have to, but flatten them every time. Flatten them till they could skip across the lake like a stone," Cherie recited the speech.

"He gave you the skipper rabbit speech. Good. I taught him that. Anyway, you stay home and get some rest. Don't chop firewood or anything strenuous. I'll check on you after work," He winked. Before he left he stopped to admire the roll-top desk. "I used to have a desk like this. Dad got rid of it to make room for Skipper's stuff after I left. Nice desk. Full of secret compartments. Well, I'm off. Be good."

Cherie soon got bored and decided to finish what she'd started the day before only this time she went out to the shed to get the work gloves she'd seen in the tool box. She saw footprints in the snow leading to the shed and back out to the road. Now she knew why they locked the shed. It wasn't just the bears, unless the bears around here wore boots.

She unlocked the roll-top desk with the tasseled key that she'd found in one of the drawers. It really was a nice desk. She left her journal and notes safely locked away. It was easier to write down her thoughts if she knew no one would see them. She'd been exploring a hidden compartment, like Lewis mentioned that his former desk had. One of the cubbyholes wasn't as deep as the others. She felt a knob and pulled it. Nothing happened. She turned it and something came down like a guillotine and cut the bejesus out of her hand. This time she proceeded with patience, caution, tools and very thick work gloves. After some time she found a way to slide out the hidden razor. She used salad tongs to remove the false wall and the little box behind that.  She opened a can of beer and sat staring at the little box for a long while. The whole damn house would probably be blown to smithereens when she opened it.

Nothing could have prepared her for what was in that box. She couldn't stop pacing. She couldn't stop shaking. She wanted to scream but didn't dare. Strange animal noises came out of instead. She sounded like a mad woman. She thought of the wolf she'd seen in the road and the lady's hand in it's mouth. She squirmed to cope with bolts of cramps and nausea and threw up before she could make it to the sink.

She pulled herself together and carefully put the Polaroid prints back in the box so as not to leave her fingerprints on them. She drove thirty miles down to the city and from there mailed the photos to the police. Afterwards she went to the main branch of the library and searched for hours through reels of old newspapers for a photo of a missing woman last seen wearing a burgundy colored coat with a fur trimmed hood. She couldn't find the woman. She would keep looking but she wouldn't let anyone know she was looking. 

"We have to stay out of this," she said out loud.

"Did you say something?" the librarian appeared from around the stacks.

"No. I was just reading," Cherie replied.

"The library closes in ten minutes," the librarian whispered.

"Yes, ma'am," Cherie gathered her things and prepared to leave.

On the long drive home she could not stop thinking that she had probably just slept with a serial killer.

She went to bed and waited for the phone to ring. She knew he would call. She knew he probably had called several times when she was gone. Finally the phone rang. He wanted to know where she'd been.

"I got cabin fever and took a drive," she answered.

"You can't handle one day off? Don't let dad find out you are like this, he'll run you ragged. Hey, are you alright?" Lewis sensed something had changed. She sounded like she despised him.

"I'm fine," she searched for the words she needed to say.

"You don't sound fine," he was worried.

"Lewis, last night was a mistake. We can't see each other anymore. I don't want to be in a relationship with anyone at this point in my life. You of all people should understand," she hung up the phone.

He gave her some space. He didn't call her for the rest of the week. Friday night he showed up at her house with fresh roses. It was freezing outside but the top was down on his Triumph. He left the headlights on and the motor running and his car cassette tape player turned up full blast.

Great clouds of steam came out of his mouth as he sang along with Frankie Valli And The Four Seasons and made a fool of himself dancing in the snow. When he gestured towards the moon and did the twist, he slipped on her sidewalk but got up without missing a beat.

The lights went off in her house. She didn't open the door. He left the roses on her porch. In the morning she received a call from Tina asking if she was well enough to return to work, that Lewis had left town and was probably never coming back. Tina was secretly glad that the romance had blown up. Her depression lifted and it showed in her voice.

"This is the very thing I was trying to warn you about. Office romances never end well," Sam Masterson put his hand on Skipper's shoulder. Skipper nodded but his mind was already focused on the fact that he'd been given a second chance to win Cherie's heart.

~ To Be Continued ~

APPLE ROAD: THE APPLE PRESS

After dinner and slow dancing for hours, Lewis took Cherie home. He drove his green Triumph sports car uncharacteristically slow. He was disarmed by how comfortable the silences were between them. They were like an old married couple in their eighties. It was like they had already said everything. He glanced over at her soft wool skirt that fell two inches below her knees. Modest yet deadly. He thought of something that made him laugh softly to himself.

"What?" Cherie realized that she couldn't read his mind after all. 

"Your skirt. The famous plaid skirt. You wore it with platform sandals the day Skipper hired you and you delivered the paper to the monks that same afternoon," Lewis shook his head. 

"Who told you that?" Cherie wondered out loud.

"I arrived just as you were leaving. It became a topic of conversation around the water cooler the day you were hired," Lewis made light of the explosions.

If it wasn't for his crazy nephew, Skipper, it was likely Lewis never would have met Cherie. And she was the reason he'd stayed this long after Christmas. Usually he was gone the day after Christmas and didn't show up again until the next Christmas. He had been keeping Tina company during her coffee break when Skipper burst into the front office of The Apple Press with Samuel Masterson hot on his heals.

Samuel Masterson was the owner of the only daily newspaper in the township of Appleblossom. He had adopted Skipper when his sister Eve Momoday died. No one knew where Skipper's father ran off to and no one was eager to find out. 

Sam saved Skipper from foster care and big city life and put him to work at the paper with the rest of his boys. Lewis started roaming about that time and got a taste for travel. His little brother Craig had the Apple Road route and at first Lewis split his Appleblossom Highway route with Skipper, which was about 35 miles and studded with stops all the way down to the city in the valley below. Eventually have gave Skipper more and more of the route until finally Skipper was handling it all on his own. It had the stops that were too dangerous for a girl, honky-tonks, rest stops, liquor stores and even the churches and the public library were dangerous later on in the day when it was getting dark and fewer people were around.

The Apple Road route was a pain in the ass but it was necessary. The Appleblossom route was how the township attracted tourists to the Apple Road treasures when tourists got off the interstate for gas and discovered the charms of Appleblossom via the paper. The Apple Road route had just a handful of stops but they were where the news of many of the coming attractions generated. 

The monks at the priory would get a bundle of the paper and give the driver copy for the next day's paper. New batches of apple cider and apple jelly, festivals and other happenings were announced in The Apple Press. The Ranger's Station took a bundle and gave reports for the next issue as well. It was a 58 mile route with only a few stops. It took up too much time for Craig and Skipper and made the days longer than they had to be.

"Who is that girl driving off in my truck? Why is that girl driving off in my truck?" Sam shouted.

"She's taking the Apple Road route. Craig and I split the Appleblossom route. It's too much for one person," Skipper mumbled.

"You hired someone without asking me? We didn't advertise an opening or did we?" Sam raised both eyebrows.

"There was no help wanted ad. She was a walk in. He hired her on the spot," Tina chimed in.

"Who asked you!" Skipper barked at her.

"I'm going to the break room to get a doughnut. Let's get out of here, Lewis! Lewis?" Tina realized Lewis was no longer paying attention to her. He was the most handsome bachelor in the township and she had him all to herself until these two bozos came bashing up the moment.

"I did a good thing. We needed help. I hired help. You said I was your right hand man!" Skipper's cheeks turned bright red.

"He's your right hand LEG man. He hired her legs. I saw it with my own eyes!" Tina was starting to get angry too.

"Shut up!" Sam and Skipper shouted at Tina at the same time.

"The only reason you are mad at me is because you are still holding out hope that Lewis is going to stay this time and everything will go back the way it used to be. But you aren't going to stay, are you, Lewis?!" Skipper tried to spread the humiliation around.

"Let's go get a doughnut, Tina, my blood sugar just dropped," Lewis took Tina's arm and they disappeared.

"Run, Lewis, run! That's all you do! You should be an Olympic runner by now! Bring home the gold next time, why don't you..." Skipper was losing his mind.

"Simmer down, Skippy! This isn't about Lewis. This is about you hiring that girl without even talking to me. What if she is a truck thief and..."

"She's not a truck thief, Uncle Sam. She's renting old lady Belle's place by the railroad. She really needed a job. I called Miss Belle and she likes her. Everybody likes her and we need the help," Skipper defended his actions.

"Don't call me 'Uncle Sam'," Sam winced.

"Don't call me 'Skippy'," Skipper fired back.

"Ok, Skipper. I'm going to talk to you like you were my own son, ok?" Sam calmed down.

"Ok." Skipper let down his guard.

"You're and IDIOT!" Sam bellowed at the top of his lungs.

"That's how you talk to me? After what you just said? You wouldn't say that to Craig or, God forbid, your precious Lewis!" Skipper was deeply wounded.

"I damn well would too if either one of them was harebrained enough to hire a girl they had the hots for! If you fall in love with a girl who just happens to work where you work, that is fate. If you hire a girl BECAUSE you want her, that is tempting fate and it's not going to have a happy ending. She's off limits now, you do know that, don't you?" Sam lectured.

"Well, she really needed work and she can handle the route," Skipper lost a lot of steam.

"Then you could have helped her find a job some where else, you understand?" Sam softened.

"Yeah. I get it," Skipper humbly realized his mistake.

* * *

Lewis walked Cherie to her door.

"Thank you," she said with a sigh.

"Thank you. It was my pleasure," both his lips disappeared. It was like he was putting them away so they wouldn't try to kiss her or he was trying not to say something.

"What?" Cherie laughed.

"Old lady Belle said you came up here for the solitude, that you wanted to be alone," he said.

"So?"

"You messed up, didn't you? I mean, everybody in town is talking about you," he smiled.

"They'll forget about me tomorrow," she smiled back.

"I won't. Well, Good night, My Dear," he imitated Dr. Walter Bramley.

"Oh God! I was going to kiss you good night until you sounded like him!" she stepped inside and closed the door.

"I'll never do it again," he promised and knocked softly until she opened the door.

The kiss lasted until dawn. She kept telling herself it was just one night. He told himself the same thing.

~ To Be Continued ~