Crouching Buzzard, Leaping Loon(28)

“And this is a very important thing to remember about all relationships,” she continued. I realized the voice was coming from the radio.





“They’re not static.”





“Yeah, but you are,” I growled back.





    I fumed for a few more minutes as Dr. Lorelei imparted more generic advice on managing one’s relationship. Possibly good advice, if you weren’t too irritated to pay attention. The woman - she sounded very young - who had apparently called in to ask Dr. Lorelei a question fell all over herself with gratitude, so maybe it was good advice. But I couldn’t help feeling irrationally annoyed that after I’d managed to cut Dr. Lorelei off in the parking lot, she’d found a way of following me home.





    Though as I learned at the end of her show, it was only luck and my normal preference for quiet thinking time on the drive home that had saved me from hearing her before. The college radio station aired Lorelei listens, her advice show, on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday afternoons at this same time, with a repeat at 1 A.M. Prerecorded, then - of course, it had to be, since the half-hour show would have been just about to start when she’d badgered me in the parking lot.





    Perhaps 1 should complain to the programming director. I began phrasing a witty letter accusing the station of air pollution. But no need - Lorelei’s days on the college station were already numbered. September 1 would bring the debut of a new nationally syndicated version of Lorelei Listens on the rival commercial radio station.





    I wondered if the college radio station would be replacing her with another psychologist who hadn’t yet broken into the big leagues. Perhaps she had recommended one of her colleagues around the office? Not that any of them seemed hot prospects to me. Certainly not Lorelei’s partner. Apparently couples therapy, like mixed doubles, had to be done in coeducational pairs. I wasn’t surprised that Lorelei had chosen to join forces with a mousy-looking male therapist so self-effacing that he never seemed to speak except to echo something Lorelei had just said.





    But at least they didn’t squabble, like the dueling weight therapists. Or Dr. Brown, inventor of the Affirmation Bear, whose improbable specialty was anger management, and who carried on a running feud with the burly, red-faced psychologist who seemed intent on browbeating the world into studying assertiveness.





    My cell phone rang. Normally I try to avoid using it while I’m driving, but I was only one block from the apartment, and when I recognized Michael’s number, I managed to pause at a stop sign and answer it. And pin it between my ear and my shoulder, which meant I looked like Quasimodo but I could still drive.





“Are you off work?” Michael asked.





“Finally,” I said. “And here I was hoping to get off a little early, what with the murder and all.”





“So that’s the real reason ya bumped him off,” Michael said, in his best Cagney imitation.





“They’ll never prove a thing. Hang on, I’m turning into the driveway - I don’t want to sideswipe the landlord’s bike again.”





    I parked the car and returned to our conversation as I descended the steep stairs into the Cave.





“So what else is new?” Michael asked as I checked the mailbox.





“Oh, God, no,” I muttered.





“What’s wrong?” he said. “If you need to hang up and call the police - “





“Nothing’s wrong,” I said. “Mother sent another package.”





“Another decorating book?”





“Odds are,” I said, stuffing the package under my left arm so I could open the front door with my good right hand.





“She’s not still into faux finishes, is she?” Michael asked, anxiously. “I really was worried that I’d come home last weekend to find she’d faux marbled the whole place.”





“No, I convinced her that no amount of faux marbling would make the Cave look like anything other than a dank, underground hole.”





“That’s a relief.”





“I did have a little trouble talking her out of the underwater grotto idea.”





“Underwater grotto?”





“Faux coral walls decorated with tasteful murals of seaweed and colorful marine life.”





“But you did talk her out of it, right?” he asked. “She doesn’t still think it’s a good idea?”





“She may, for all I know. But after I told her what I thought about it, she hasn’t spoken to me for nearly a week. I suppose the book’s intended as a peace offering.”