Author's note.
Relax everyone this is just a little bit of fluff to lighten your day. Not really advancing the genre, but hopefully you'll find it entertaining. Spectacularly short for one of my offerings (don't worry, I have an 8 or 9 pager coming). I originally tried to condense it to meet the 750 word challenge, but finally said screw it; I couldn't make it work.
Thank you to my editor for the review. It's always better after receiving input. All mistakes are my own.
***
Rosanne heard the knocking on the door and was tempted to let it go. Raymond, her husband of six years should have been home by now, and it pissed her off that the eight inches of snow that fell early in the morning, while she was at work at the hospital, hadn't been shoveled yet. With the clouds having cleared out and a north wind picking up, the temperature had sunk like a rock. She would be damned before she cleared the driveway.
Seeing the above-mentioned snow, she had called her husband earlier, to find out when he was going to be home, but couldn't reach him. Figures. She thought it was just like him to try and get out of work. Asshole.
She had changed into her jeans at the hospital and was planning to relax that late Sunday afternoon after an early morning and busy day in various operating rooms and birthing suites, as anesthesiologists usually are. Since she had only been on staff eighteen months, she drew weekend duty.
She heard the knock again and went to answer the door, perturbed that Raymond wasn't there to answer it. She peeked through the peephole and saw Dell standing there, out of uniform, next to a man she didn't recognize, in uniform.
Dell, also known as Randell, was a Detective Sergeant in the Sheriff's office a couple of counties north of Minneapolis, where he and Raymond grew up. He was supposed to have been ice fishing with her husband this weekend. Dell was the biggest redneck she ever met. She couldn't believe her husband and him were best friends, which always pissed her off when they got together.
Raymond had just gotten back into ice fishing this winter. She knew he did it as a teenager but couldn't understand why he became interested in freezing his ass off again. It may have been related to his recent illness, or not.
"God dammit, Dell. What the hell do you want? I thought my no-good husband was with your sorry ass."
Dell was not surprised by the greeting. The two of them had never gotten along; especially not the last two years after she had been caught cheating on Ray.
"This isn't a social call, Rosie. It's freakin' cold out here. Can we come in?"
"I've told you that it's Rosanne! I don't even like for Raymond to call me Rosie. So, no; don't come in. That will give you incentive to get this over quickly."
Dell let out a loud sigh. "Damn you, Rosanne...Fine. This is officer Tyler Perkins with the state patrol. He has some official business he needs to discuss with you."
Rosanne looked up at the giant of an officer. She wondered where they always seemed to find these huge men to be officers. With his hat on, he looked nearly seven feet tall, though was probably closer to six foot six.
The man said, "Mrs. Franklin, I'm sorry to inform you that your husband and his vehicle fell through the ice earlier this morning. The portion of the lake in which he fell is over 150 feet deep, and the ice in the area is considered not stable enough to bring in the big recovery gear. Current recovery efforts have been unsuccessful, and with his being down there so long, they do not believe anyone could still be alive. They'll try again in couple of days, when the weather is better, to retrieve the vehicle and his body. These are some pictures from the scene prior to the recovery crews showing up."
The officer had a tablet and swiped through several pictures where she could clearly see Raymond's tent and camp stove sitting near a big hole in the ice where it appeared that Raymond's truck was too heavy for the ice to support. There were also a couple of pictures of the dive team showing up with their lighter equipment they would use to raise the truck if they could find it, setting up earlier in the day.
Rosanne said, "That dumb shit. He doesn't even know how to fish correctly. Now who's going to clear this God damn snow off the driveway. I swear to God, he cannot even die right. Poor Samantha. I'll bet she wishes you were with him."
The officer was stunned to see that this woman was completely unfazed by her husband's death. Dell wasn't surprised. The second honeymoon after her mother convinced Raymond to take her back didn't last long. She had been a harpy towards Dell for years.
Dell said, "I warned Ray about going out too far. This winter hasn't been as cold, so it wasn't safe to go too far out, but he kept pressing his luck."
Rosanne replied, "Maybe the headaches from his cancer were becoming too difficult to bear, and he decided to take the cowards way out and off himself?"
Dell face showed his surprise, "You knew about the cancer?"
Rosanne replied, "Of course, I did. That fool cannot hide anything from me. He thought he was keeping it a secret, but when I saw the check to the hospital for $4,000 dollars and discovered the CT scan of his puny brain, hidden in his office files, I knew. At least I found them in time to get a couple of different life insurance policies on his ass. Now, do you need anything else from me?"
Dell shook his head at the gall of this woman. "Damn. That's cold; even for you Rosie."
"It's Rosanne, asshole."
The officer tried to regain control of the situation. "Ma'am. We should have the paperwork for you to sign either by late tomorrow or the following morning. Hopefully we'll have the body soon. I'm sorry for your loss."
"Don't worry about it. Let me know when they fish his ass out, and I'll give you the name of a funeral home to clean it and fry it. Get it? Fish his ass out? Clean and fry?" She looked at them, but they were not laughing. "Oh, lighten up. He wasn't a saint, either. Have you told his mom yet?"
"No. We're required by law to notify you first. Do you want to tell her or for us to do it?"
Rosanne said, "We aren't on the best speaking terms, so it might be better if you do it. If you don't need anything else, I have things I have to do. Like get warm. Excuse me."
Both men stood there with their mouths open as she closed the door on them.
As they turned to leave, they heard a "Woo Hoo! Hot Damn!" through the door.
