All About the Pie, fiction by J.E. Ivin

Gene Polson had a keen mind, a woodworker’s hands, and an appetite for sweet treats and women, not necessarily in that order. Everyone in Star Lake knew the man. Most liked him. However, they shook their heads and sighed whenever they saw him escorting a new lady friend to The Sand Bar, named after the actual sandy bar visible in the lake. The natural formation served as a gathering spot for pontoon boats during the summer season. Tourists loved the watery drinking hole. Locals, not so much. Too raucous. Too down-state. For residents, the bricks-and-mortar establishment remained the only place in town where one could get a beer, cop a feel, and savor a yummy dessert without moving off the barstool. Over the years, the mirrored ceiling had witnessed most of Gene’s liaisons, beginning with the one that produced his only child. But it never saw the final hookup coming, the one that left the town reeling and the philandering Polson’s disappearance a puzzle no one could solve.

Gene and I had established a tenuous relationship ever since we fought to a draw in fourth grade over who would be best friends with Jeri Liotta, Star Lake’s perennial queen of hearts. While Gene and I remained friendly rivals, he and Jeri were an on-again, off-again romantic couple. After Gene’s divorce from the bitch from Syracuse, he and Jeri established a friends-with-benefits relationship that shocked no one. After all, Peyton Place had nothing on the randy behaviors of the inhabitants of an isolated Adirondack hamlet with nothing but forests and each other to explore.

The gossip mill had pretty much ground to a halt the year a Maryland couple with more money than brains gobbled up four cabins, intending to rent them out during tourist season and rake in the money. Of course, the Iversons had no clue about maintenance and needed a caretaker to spruce up the dated homes. I helped them out until I passed the bar and my legal practice took off. When Gregor Iverson died suddenly of a heart attack, his widow Malva inherited his estate. That included the ill-advised investment in Star Lake tourism. With no home improvement skills and less interest in learning any, she begged me for help. Not thinking things through, I referred her to Gene.

Malva was one of those canny Southern belles with an eye for handsome and a nose for rich. Soon as she stepped foot in Gene’s workshop, she recognized the smell of old money wafting from my friend’s pores. It didn’t take her long to tease out the details of his life – unprotected sex leading to a premature departure from university studies. The hasty wedding that turned two wild young things into embittered adults determined to claw their adulterous way to divorce, child in tow. Anyway, Gene had been doing just fine with Jeri, who had her own trust fund, shared his musical tastes, and enjoyed traveling with him to Caribbean playgrounds. She was, like all of us, well aware of his flirtatious tendencies and accepted his wandering eye, until Malva began her campaign. That’s when the proverbial shit hit the fan.

The day in question was typical Northwoods cool, with blowsy clouds flitting across the horizon. Humidity rested near zero. Alcoholic beverages beckoned in the late afternoon, with a Jimmy Buffet song or two to ease the way toward dinner. On days like this, Gene and I had a standing date to meet halfway between our respective residences and make our way to The Sand Bar. Anticipating he’d be tardy, a signature Gene move, I strolled from the office to the knoll overlooking the lake when I saw Malva on the path below. All dolled up in a body-hugging dress and high heels, those double Ds of hers leading the way, she wobbled across the lawn to the back of Gene’s house. He had just stepped out to meet me when she fired the first salvo in her war to win his hand and his money. I edged closer along the fence rail, willing the wind to bend their conversation my way.

“Halloo,” Malva called, her drawl more pronounced than ever. “Oh, Gene, wait up, y’all. I’ve got a surprise for you.”

“Can’t it wait, Malva? I’ve got a date with a margarita.”

Clutching at his shirt sleeve for balance, she held out a ceramic pie pan. “I baked you a special treat.”

The remainder of their conversation was muted. Gene glanced my way, hesitated. Then he grinned. Whatever she handed him appealed to his sweet tooth. I watched him lead her back to the house and waited for her to leave. Half an hour passed, but neither Malva nor Gene reappeared. The strains of “Margaritaville” drifted through the screen door. Did I mention Gene was quite a dancer? I shook my head, pondered the likelihood of my old frenemy meeting me at the bar, and carried this latest bit of gossip to my favorite barstool.

That was the beginning of the pie campaign. Despite repeated entreaties from me, Gene spent fewer and fewer afternoons in the bar and more time fixing real and imaginary problems in one of Malva’s cabins. I thought he’d tire of this flirtation as he had so many others. I thought he’d rejoin the Star Lake fold, return to me. I was wrong. Malva fired salvo after salvo: apple, peach crumble, blueberry, lemon meringue. Gene’s stomach grew rounder, his eyes glazed and crusty from all that sweetness.

At the beginning of August, Jeri, frantic, caught up to me just as I was about to leave for court. She was dragging a suitcase behind her and had a garbage bag with what appeared to be stuffed animals over her shoulder. “Pat,” she said, “you have to help me.”

“What’s wrong, Jeri?” I matched my long strides to her shorter ones as she paced the crumbling driveway in front of the law office. I checked my watch. If I stayed too long, I’d miss my court date. Judges frowned on that. Besides, Jeri had spurned my loyalty long ago.

“It’s Gene and that,” she swallowed a sob. Tears dripped freely, leaving mascara streaks down her sunburned face. “That Malva person. She packed my suitcase. Stuffed all my lovies in this garbage bag. Threw everything out of Gene’s house. Left them right outside where rain or raccoons or scavengers could have ruined them.”

“I didn’t know you and Gene were living together.”

The sunburn turned to a deeper blush. “We weren’t exactly, but he made promises. We had an arrangement. I stayed over often enough that he let me keep my collectables there.”

“Well, look, hon, I have to get to court.” Her lower lip trembled the way it used to way back in grade school. I didn’t have it in me to take my anger out on her. It was Gene and Malva who deserved that, him for deserting me and her for luring him away. “Meet me later and we’ll talk. I’m sure it’s just a misunderstanding.”

“Oh, no, it’s not.” She drew up like a peacock warding off danger. “Gene is going to marry her.”

What? A seismic shockwave traveled through me. Gene Polson marrying was the worst disaster I could imagine. He had sworn off legalizing any partnership so many times over the years, even refused the invitation to share my law practice after he completed his studies online and passed the bar. I never expected him to turn me down. We worked well together, drank together even better. Over the years, I had accepted his arrangement with Jeri, even if it galled. But marrying Malva Ivers? That was a step too far. As I headed for my car, I looked back over my shoulder and made a decision. “Meet me at The Sand Bar. Six. You can tell me everything then.”

Jeri dropped her head and slumped her shoulders. “It’s all,” she said, “about the pie.”

Later that night and for weeks after, we questioned, we analyzed, we dissected every detail. I tried calling Gene several times until he finally blocked my number. I went to his house. Citing a previous commitment, he denied me entry. Malva stood in the background, gloating. The situation was getting out of control. I was his attorney, damn it, but the grapevine let me know he and Malva had gone to a solicitor in Tupper Lake and drawn up a new will. She-hag Iverson now stood to inherit everything Gene and his family had acquired through the years. I didn’t care about the money. I had lost my oldest friend to a scheming con woman. My heart stuttered, while my head conjured scenarios where the despicable Maryland wife disappeared forever. Funny, then, how things worked out.

By the end of September, rumor had it that Gene needed surgery for a minor hemorrhoid problem. Jeri and I nursed our mojitos and shared a litany of torture devices we’d like to apply to the dreadful woman who had stolen our beloved Gene.

“Despite all those pies,” Jeri burped, “Gene’s tests all came back fine, although he is a bit overweight.”

I chuckled, looked into the mirror behind the bar, and wondered what Gene had seen in Malva and Jeri that he never saw in me. “So, he shouldn’t have any problem with anesthesia, right?”

A second burp followed by a spate of hiccups. Her position as records secretary at the local hospital gave her access to everybody’s personal folder, and the buzz she was currently feeding loosened her tongue. Occasionally, she let slip a detail or two, which I appreciated. After all, as defense lawyer to the local sleaze crowd, I could use all the help available. So, my friend Gene, in anticipation of the coming surgery, had routine blood work that showed normal. Yet Malva, spreading word around town that the man was pre-diabetic, continued to serve him pie. Set off all my bells, but what could I do? Jeri and I were spurned, tossed aside like empty plates. I stewed in my own alcoholic juice for a few hours, then decided to stroll over to the Polson’s residence and force the issue one more time. Robed and ready for bed, Malva met me at the door. Since the sun had yet to fully disappear over the far horizon, I suspected there was more at play here than I realized. “I need to speak to Gene,” I said. “It’s a legal matter.”

“My husband is indisposed,” she huffed. “You can tell me whatever it is.”

Husband? When did they do the deed? There had been no announcement, no ceremony, no celebration. I tried to force my way past her. She blocked me with her body, those monstrous boobs bobbing against my own. “Malva, let me in.”

“Take one more step, Patricia, and I’m calling the sheriff.” It was a feeble threat. She had no phone in hand, and if she turned to retrieve it, I’d slip in anyway. I heard a whimper from the library, a low throaty noise like someone with a mouthful of mush. Or pie. I shoved Malva aside and raced toward the scuffling sound of a body dragging across the floor. I found Gene lying half in and half out of the doorway to his precious book room. His eyes were glassy and unfocused, his mouth open. There was a drool spot on the carpet. Malva stomped by me.

“Call the rescue squad,” I barked. “Gene? Gene?”

The woman wrung her hands, paced the tiny library, then snatched her phone from the desk, littered, I noted, with legal documents, and dialed the emergency number. At the Clifton-Fine Hospital, they pumped his stomach, checked for a stroke, finally settled on food poisoning. They urged him to remain overnight for observation. Malva insisted on taking him home. Gene didn’t argue. I followed them back to Star Lake, watched from across the yard as they pulled into the driveway and got out. He looked back once, nodded at me, and followed her inside. The hemorrhoid surgery was canceled for good.

As autumn approached, covering the mountains in full glorious color, Jeri and I continued to meet at The Sand Bar for drinks and gossip. She didn’t say anything else about the wicked witch from the south. I didn’t tell her about Gene’s emails, the ones where he apologized for his rude dismissal of our friendship, told me he was back to cooking for himself, and asked me to find him a hunting cabin in the eastern Adirondacks. Something remote, he wrote, off the beaten track. A place only he and I knew about. Talk about serendipitous. I couldn’t have done it better myself.

Despite a fervent wish for the crisp days to linger, a sleety rain found us on the cusp of the autumn equinox. The purchase was a done deal. So was the plan. While I waited for Gene’s signal, I finished baking the pie, chuckling over the special ingredient in the crust. When my phone rang once and stopped, I ran the dessert over to Gene’s while Malva was at the salon in Watertown getting her hair dyed to hide the gray creeping in. I toted the pie she baked back to my place, debated whether to have it tested, then dumped the whole thing in the trash. I don’t know what else she and Gene had for dinner that night, but I know he served Malva a big slice of my apple pie, waited for her to pass out, and carried her down to the lake. I helped him row out past the sand bar and dump her comatose body into the water, then handed over the keys to my father’s old Caddy, the one nobody remembered I kept in the garage. Gene never thanked me for the pie, for helping dispose of evidence, for my loyalty. He simply headed for the retreat I’d purchased, convinced he’d found a way out of the entanglement he’d gotten himself into. If he had called me, once he settled in, I might have warned him, but he didn’t. Neither did I. Sometime later that week, I think the pie I sent with him was too much temptation to ignore. I never heard from him again.

Despite all inquiries, no one in Star Lake ever discovered what happened to Gene Polson. Malva’s body eventually surfaced. Toxicology revealed an abundance of sedatives in her blood, all consistent with her prescriptions. Autumn slid into winter. Ice covered the lake. Life as we knew it slipped by, full of gossip and theories, each more bizarre than the last.

“Maybe,” Jeri speculated one frigid December night as she stared into the mirror behind the bar, “Malva put him in the lake before she drowned herself.” I kept my own counsel, sad that Gene had never seen me for what I was, the best choice of partner, friend, lover. Still, I won in the end. When his house went up for sale, I bought it. Once new gossip replaced the old, I gave up drinking, but only for a while, and when winter gave way to spring, I met Jeri, gave my friend all the hugs she craved, then ordered another beer and a slice of humble pie.

J.E. Irvin is an educator, a poet, and the author of seven mystery/thriller novels. Her shorter works have appeared in a variety of print and online publications, including Hawaii Pacific Review, Alfred Hitchcock Mystery Magazine, Creosote, The Raven’s Perch, Sky Island Journal, and Flying Island Journal. Irvin, her husband, and their two crazy cats live in southwestern Ohio on the edge of a nature park, which serves as inspiration for much of her work.

 

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