Page 34 of Starved Until Sunset

“Nope.”

The two-way radio on Demetrius’s belt squawked and John the Bastard’s voice rumbled through the small speaker. “Singleton and Bower, pick up.”

“Get thee behind me, Satan,” Cody grumbled.

Demetrius chuckled as he unclipped the radio. “This is Demetrius. Sorry, Singleton.”

“Pete and Spiffy need your help with potholes out on 118.”

“Fuck, not those two again.” Cody pulled the final limp balloon free. “Shrieky Pete and Spiffy Johnson. The worst vaudeville act in history. I’m coming down.”

Demetrius moved to the side of the ladder and held it with one hand. Cody’s big, booted feet on the rungs sent vibrations up and down the aluminum ladder.

“Are they east or west of town?” Demetrius said into the radio.

“East,” John said. “Just past the old folks place.”

Cody glared at the radio in Demetrius’s hand. “That fucker knows we have relatives out there.”

Demetrius nodded and, making sure to keep his finger off the transmit button, said, “He does. But it’s important to remember he’s John the Bastard, not John the Fucker.”

“In my mind he just got promoted.”

Demetrius smiled and placed a hand on Cody’s chest. His body heat had warmed the heavy flannel he’d pulled on that morning. He tightened his fingers a few times, scratching Cody’s chest, and pressed the transmit button. “We’re just finishing up downtown. We’ll head out there next.”

“We need everything patched today. All the way up to the county line. Overtime approved to get it done tonight. Out.”

John the Bastard clicked off, and Demetrius met Cody’s angry gaze.

“You know those two have been taking their sweet time out there,” Cody said with a snarl.

“Spiffy probably had some lawns to cut and rake for his side business.”

“How does he still have a job with the city?”

“John likes him.”

“John likes everyone but us.”

Cody lowered the ladder then picked it up and tipped it sideways. Demetrius took the back end of it and they walked toward the big city truck parked down the street.

“We were kind of dumped on him by the mayor and Lucia,” Demetrius said.

“He’s lucky to have us.”

“Yeah. But still.”

Demetrius thought they were also lucky to have paying jobs in their small hometown, but he decided it might be best not to say it at that moment. He also thought it might be best not to tell Cody he’d taken the long way home after checking on Amelia the day before and driven through both of Parson’s Hollow’s cemeteries. He had been curious to see if he might spot anything unusual among the graves. All had seemed well. No graves appeared disturbed, and while he’d been relieved, he’d also been even more intrigued.

After a short drive out east on 118, they saw another city dump truck moving slowly along the gravel shoulder of the two lane blacktop. Spiffy Johnson was behind the wheel, and Shrieky Pete slouched in the passenger seat. Both men looked tired, hungover most likely. Or in Spiffy’s case, hungover and overworked as he tried to maintain two full time jobs.

Cody pulled up behind them and parked on the shoulder. Demetrius climbed down and followed Cody toward the other truck. It didn’t stop moving, just kept rolling along at a crawl, so they jogged a bit to come up alongside the cab and Cody waved his arms.

“Spiff!” Cody shouted even though Spiffy had his window down and arm hanging out.

Spiffy looked over and smiled but didn’t stop the truck. “Hey, guys. Glad you could make it.”

Demetrius thought he heard Shrieky Pete say something like “Finally,” from the other side of the cab.