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“You mean you haven’t seen it?”
“Seen what?”
“Owen,” the chief bellows from his office before she gets the chance to answer. “March it in here.”
The other deputies laugh again. Shit.
“Yes, sir?” I step into his office. He motions for me to close his door. Double shit.
“Now, son, I don’t know exactly what’s going on, but you need to get this nipped in the bud. It’s just not professional. Nor is it the image of this sheriff’s office we want to portray. How will the locals be able to take you seriously if they’re too busy thinking about a poem to your backside?” I’m going to kill her. “Why don’t you head on over to the post office and get that dealt with?”
“Yes, sir.” I open my mouth to try and apologize, but he’s already back to reading through the reports on his desk. How do you apologize for something you haven’t even seen yet anyway? “I’ll get right on that.”
He nods, and I leave his office.
“You know, it’s not all bad. I wouldn’t mind an ode or two to my ass,” Arlo says as I march toward the door.
“And you can always use it to supplement your income. You already have a stripper uniform.” Ray laughs. I hear them all laugh as the front door closes behind me.
I jump in my cruiser and make the short drive to the post office. There’s a small crowd around the community bulletin board.
It’s one of those small town typical ones. One side is a place to hang up garage sales, lost dogs, and general announcements with push pins. The other side is a board with white plastic letters inside a glass case that gives information about a major event. Like the Lion’s Club pancake supper that used to be there.
The side with the push pins looks fine. The other side, however, is not. What used to be all the details for the pancake fundraiser is now a poem. A haiku, to be precise. About my ass. Three lines, seventeen words describing someone’s backside. It’s not necessarily mine.
His backside is fine.
Round, firm, like steel orbs I find.
They beg deputy.
“You know, it’s not bad,” someone says. “I would guess something Austen Caraway wrote since she’s the only one with the writing chops.”
“But why use the new deputy’s bottom when she has the Campbell boy’s for inspiration?” someone else points out.
“It could be about anyone,” I try.
“No, it’s you.” Someone else laughs. “None of those other boys have had an ode about their butt on the bulletin board before. Not until you.”
“Damn Eliot,” I grumble.
“No. Can’t be Eliot. You’ve got the wrong sister. That one is too straight and narrow for this.”
“Straight and narrow, my ass.” I hear the words leave my mouth too late to stop them. There’s chuckling behind me. I squeeze my eyes shut for a moment in frustration. “Who has the key to this thing?”
“I do,” a tiny woman announces. “I’m the postmistress, Lana.”
“Lana, can you please change this back?”
“I can as soon as I get the other letters back.”
“Other letters? You mean there are more of these signs?” I’m going to kill her. Eliot, not the postmistress.
“There are three others. One at the body shop, one at the library, and one at the Baptist church,” she informs me. “I’ll bet Pastor Greg is fit to be tied if his board is anything like this one. At least ours is PG-rated. I heard the body shop had a real humdinger.”
“Okay,” I say after a minute. “Can you please take this down, and I’ll see to getting your letters back to you?” There’s a rumble of disgruntlement from the crowd behind me. If they want to read more about my ass, they’ll have to wait for the book.
“Are you sure that’s what you want to do?” Lana asks.
