“We can’t leave him like this.” Maggie looked skyward. “I think it’s going to snow.”
“There’s a surprise,” I muttered.
Winter in Mayville Heights, Minnesota, came in three varieties: About to Snow, Snowing, and Get Out the Shovel. I had to concede, though, that the town looked like something out of an old Currier & Ives greeting card. Snow decorated the tree branches, frost sparkled on windowpanes, and there was a complete snowman in every second yard.
It was my first real winter in town. I’d arrived last year at the tail end of the season to be the new librarian and supervise the renovations to the library building for its upcoming centennial.
I looked at Eddie’s backside sticking out of the rear of the SUV. “I have an idea,” I said. “Roma, can you grab Eddie’s left thigh?”
She pushed back her hood. “With pleasure,” she said with a grin. She gave Faux Eddie a pat on the behind and caught him by the leg and the waist. I took the other side and we lifted him out of the back of the SUV. Though he wasn’t a real body, he was still heavy.
“Now what?” Roma asked.
“Be careful,” Maggie said, hovering behind us.
“Open the passenger’s door,” I told her.
“You can’t put his feet in the front and his head in the back,” she warned. “Once Roma starts driving he’ll slide backward and break.”
“That’s not what I’m doing,” I said. “Trust me.”
Maggie was my closest friend in Mayville. We’d met when I’d joined the tai chi class she taught, and bonded over our mutual love of the cheesy reality show Gotta Dance. She was a talented collage artist, but I’d never seen her so worked up about a commission.
She chewed her lip for a second, then caught herself. Putting both hands on her stomach, she took several slow deep breaths. “Sorry,” she said. “This whole project is making me crazy. Do whatever you were going to do.” She reached over and opened the passenger’s door.
“What are we doing?” Roma whispered.
“We’re putting him in the front seat. You take the shoulders and I’ll take his legs,” I said. We set Eddie on the front passenger’s seat, legs out to the side.
“Turn him around,” I said to Roma. She shifted Eddie to face the windshield, while I moved his legs, resting his skates on the floor mat. Then I leaned in and fastened the seat belt. “Ta da,” I said, backing out of the SUV.
Roma walked around to the front of the vehicle and looked through the windshield. “He looks so real,” she said.
I nodded. “Yeah, he does.”
Maggie couldn’t help checking the seat belt herself. Roma closed the tailgate, then came around and got in behind the wheel. I climbed in the backseat, sliding over to make room for Maggie.
Roma backed out of the alley and headed down the street. I’d met her at tai chi, too, but the friendship between the three of us had really been cemented last summer when Mags and I had coerced Roma into helping us follow someone, à la Charlie’s Angels.
“Thanks for doing this, Roma,” Maggie said.
She smiled at us in the rearview mirror. “I don’t mind. How often do I get the chance to drive around with a celebrity?” She reached over and patted Eddie’s shoulder. “Well, sort of a celebrity.”
“Eddie’s having the best season of his career,” Maggie said. “Forty goals and thirty-five assists so far.”
“Really?” I said, working not to let her see me smile.
“And he’s probably in the best shape of his career, as well. Did you know he does extra skating drills on his own after practice?”
“I did not know that,” Roma said solemnly.
Maggie pulled off a mitten and reached forward to fix the back of Eddie’s jersey. “Every single Wild home game has been sold out this season and it’s because of Eddie.”
I pulled off my own mittens and fished in my pocket for lip balm. “You know, Roma,” I said, “I never thought it would happen, but I think Matt Lauer has some competition for Maggie’s heart.” I saw Roma’s face widen into a grin.
“Do you think Eddie can dance?” Roma asked, referring to Matt Lauer’s improbable win on the previous season of Gotta Dance.
“Gee, I don’t know. He does have some smooth moves.”
“Ha, ha, ha,” Maggie said. “I don’t have a thing for Eddie Sweeney.”
“Of course not,” Roma said. “He’s only tall, strong and gorgeous.”
Maggie squared her shoulders. “I’m just a fan of Eddie’s athletic abilities—that’s all.”
“Oh, me, too,” Roma retorted. “If I were just a little bit younger . . .” She let the end of the sentence trail away, and grinned.
We turned left at the corner and drove down Main Street under the huge Winterfest banner stretched across the road in front of the James Hotel.
“So, how long has Winterfest been going on?” I asked.
“Since I was a kid,” Maggie said. “And before that.”
Roma nodded. “It started out as an ice-fishing competition back in the forties.”
“I didn’t know that,” Maggie said.
“Oh, yeah. People came from all over the state.” Roma put on her blinker to turn in to the community center parking lot. She shot a quick glance back over her shoulder at Maggie. “Which door?”
“The side one, please,” Maggie said, shifting to peer through the windshield. “Tell me there’s a perfectly good reason it looks like no one else is here.”
Except for one light I’d noticed at the front entrance, the building seemed to be closed.
“Sam’s been on an energy-saving kick,” Roma said. “He can go overboard pretty easily.”
Sam was the mayor of Mayville Heights, and Roma was right. His efforts to save energy had gone a little bit too far for some people.
She pulled into a parking spot close to the door and shut off the SUV. “Let’s get Eddie inside,” she said.
We reversed the process of putting Eddie in the passenger’s seat. Maggie went ahead to hold the door for us.
It was locked. “No,” she groaned, kicking the door with her heavy boot. “Hey, anybody in there?” she called.
Silence.
“Seven o’clock, Thorsten said. Seven. O’. Clock. Where is he?”
I looked around. Thorsten was the building’s caretaker. There were maybe a half dozen vehicles in the parking lot. None of them were Thorsten’s.
“Can you hold on to Eddie while I try to find out what’s going on?” Maggie asked, pulling out her cell phone.
“Sure,” I said. I tucked Eddie’s knees against my sides. Roma pulled his body a little closer, wrapping her arms around his chest. I couldn’t help wondering what this would look like to anyone walking by.
Maggie punched a number into the phone and took a couple of slow deep breaths while she waited for it to ring on the other end. She made a face. “Voice mail.” She waited another moment. “Thorsten, it’s Maggie Adams. I’m at the community center and the building is locked. Where are you?” She rattled off her cell number and pressed the END button. “Who else is on the Winterfest committee?” she asked.
“Rebecca,” Roma said.
Maggie made a face. “I don’t want to bring her down here in the cold.”
Eddie was heavy for a guy that was mostly cotton padding. My arms were starting to cramp. “What about Mary?” I said. Mary worked for me at the library.
“Do you know her number?” Maggie asked.
I recited it to her.
“Thanks,” she said, putting the phone up to her ear. We waited, then Maggie let out a breath. She watched it slowly dissipate in the frigid air. “Does anyone answer the phone?”
Eddie’s back end was hanging dangerously close to a pile of dirty snow. I tightened my grip on his legs.
“Call Oren,” Roma said. “He did some work on the ceiling this week, fixing that leak from the ice buildup. He’ll have a key.” Oren Kenyon was a jack-of-all-trades. He’d worked on the library renovation last summer as well as getting the Stratton Theater ready for the Wild Rose Summer Music Festival.