Murder Takes A Bow - A Betty Crawford Mystery (The Betty Crawford Mysteries) (6 page)

Jenny nodded. "Then I’d really recommend this one. It helps to have all the information you need in one place, and it’s about the size of cell phone so you can carry it in a jacket pocket or you can just leave it in whatever purse you use and not worry about losing it or leaving it behind."

"Perfect," Betty said.

Jenny reached down on the shelf and pulled up another box. "You’ll need some extra test strips as well. And once I’ve rung you up, I can show you how to use it."

Relief flooded into Betty. "Jenny," she said seriously, "I think I love you."

Jenny laughed.

"Why don’t we ring you up, and then I’ll show you."

When her purchase was made, Jenny showed her how to insert the test strip into the device and match the code on the screen with the code on her test strip vial. Then she helped Betty prick her finger and place the drop of blood on the sample site. The 5 second countdown to her results began.

"You’ll want to wash your hands before doing this normally," Jenny said, "but sometimes that’s just not practical. The important thing is to take samples regularly. You’ll want to talk to your doctor about what your levels should be."

Betty’s three digit blood sugar number flashed on the screen. 188.

"Is that high?"

"Yes it's high but that's today. Once the Metformin takes effect and you change your exercise and eating regime you should see those numbers come down. Here."

The pharmacist gathered up some diabetes pamphlets and handed them to Betty. "Read these. They won't tell you everything you need to know but it's a start. The pamphlets were green and yellow, with horrible bold faced font and glaring titles. What is Diabetes? Glucose: The Diabetic’s Guide. Diet and Exercise: Living Healthy With Diabetes. They certainly looked promising.

"Is there anything else I can help you with today?" Jenny asked.

I wonder if she’s related to Mary Poppins? Betty wondered. Jenny certainly acted the part. She’d had an answer for every question that Betty would have asked, had her brain been able to wrap around the idea of forming intelligent sentences. She’d helped Betty go from completely panicking about the possibility of going blind to having some sort of control. Betty now understood at least a small part of her treatment, and the relief that came with that knowledge almost had her weak at the knees. To top it all off, Jenny had managed all of this with an insanely cheerful smile on her face. Well, it didn’t hurt to see what else Jenny had up her sleeve. So, only half joking, Betty asked, "Do you have any tips for coaching a girl’s basketball team?"

"Do you coach?"

"I’m covering for my friend this afternoon," Betty said. "I haven’t even played a game since high school!"

Jenny raised an eyebrow. "Good luck."

Apparently, Jenny’s bag of tricks didn’t extend that far.

CHAPTER 8

It was still early in the afternoon. If Betty was going to recoup the cost of her new medical supplies, she absolutely had to go get some work done before heading off to the basketball game. One of the perks of starting her own business was that she could work from home and set her own hours. Unfortunately, that also meant that she had to force herself to sit down at her desk and attempt to get something done. So far, the day had been a complete bust work wise.

Betty’s parents still lived in the house where Betty had been born. It wasn’t a giant home, or a modern home, but it was cozy. It had just enough room for the three of them to coexist comfortably without constantly tripping over each other’s toes. The house was a white, two story affair with two front entrances, one from the driveway into the kitchen and one from the porch into the living room. The porch had a creaky old swing on one side and a pair of wooden lawn chairs with a table between them on the other side. At one point, all the porch furniture had been painted white, but years of use and weather had worn the paint almost completely off, except for a peeling spot here or there. The front yard wasn’t the manicured lawn visible in many of the wealthier homes around town, but a rough, closely cropped hodgepodge of whatever flowers and grass decided to take root. All around the base of the house flowering bushes sprouted and spread, with a mixture of irises, day lilies, tulips, daffodils, and whatever other flowers took her mother’s fancy springing up between and around them. The flowers were well tended and weeded, but nonetheless managed to appear like wild, beautiful chaos. The large tree in the front yard still had the remains of the wooden swing from when she was a girl.

The house wasn’t fancy, but it was well loved. And it was home.

Betty pulled into the driveway, hoping against hope that she’d be able to just head upstairs and get to work without having to answer any questions. She couldn’t afford any more distractions or delays today. She entered through the kitchen door, letting it slam behind her. "I’m home!" she called. Silence answered her.

Betty’s home had a very open design. The kitchen counter and appliances rested along the left side of the house, and the kitchen’s hardwood floor spread right into the dining area. Large windows and a chandelier in the middle of the ceiling lit the whole area. The floor ended next to the stairs, where the living room’s carpet flooring began. Betty could see at one glance that no one was home.

Betty set her purse down on the marbled counter and picked up the note that lay there.

"Betty, your father and I are out visiting some friends. We’ll be back in time for dinner. Could you cook dinner tonight? We can all eat together around seven. See you then! Love, Mom"

Wonderful, Betty thought. There was yet another thing to add to her growing list of things to do. Though, she supposed that she could try and find a diabetes friendly recipe online. In the meantime though, she really did have to get to work. She headed up the stairs, floorboards creaking under her feet.

When she’d lost her job in L.A., no thanks to the current economy, Betty had been unable to find another job. She’d looked at her interests for something that could make her money. Theater and online shopping topped the list. Now she had her own online business buying and selling items, with a specialty in odd objects and period specific costumes or props.

Betty’s bedroom, still sporting the bright purple walls she’d insisted on in high school, had been divided into two halves. In one half, she slept and read and lived. Her bed, neatly made before she’d left in the morning, sported a dark jean bedspread and pillowcases. A couple of her stuffed animals from childhood that had managed to stick around lay propped up against the pillows. A jukebox CD player stood in the far corner. Her dresser, which she’d hand painted in high school to look like the sky at sunset, had a three level bookshelf propped on top of it. The bookshelf was strewn with knick knacks and trophies from high school theater competitions. Posters from some of her favorite plays and bands hung on the wall. Les Miserables. A Doll’s House. Sinead O’Connor. A small bookshelf was packed with scripts, bad romance novels and thrillers. Her dirty laundry sat in a pile in the corner, waiting to be washed.

The other half of the room, the half nearest the door, had been turned into a makeshift office. A cork board hung above her desk, layered with notes and phone numbers. Wire shelves stretching to the ceiling, packed with carefully labeled plastic bins that held her business’s inventory. A few larger items were stored in the garage, but everything else she sold was right on those shelves. Her computer desk had small stacks of papers and post its scattered across every visible bit of surface.

Betty sat down and signed into her account.

She had 10 new e mails.

Seven of them were spam.

Delete.

One was from the local newspaper, asking for an interview with her about Clarise. She sent back a reply that she had no comment. She’d be damned if they used her to turn her best friend’s life into a circus.

Two were from clients who’d ordered multiple boxes of organic cotton jeans. Three Rings Organic Work Clothes was missing six pairs. Went’s Shipping was missing two pairs.

It wasn’t the first time items had gone missing from Betty’s shipments. Sometimes things got lost in transit, and when she was sending out dozens of boxes a week she was bound to get a few flukes. Admittedly, her customers were sending more complaints since she’d moved her operation to Lofton. She’d assumed it was just because Lofton was in the back waters of North Carolina. The postal service here wasn’t nearly as streamlined as it was in Los Angeles.

But two missing boxes on the same day struck her as odd. She added "look into missing jeans" to a to do list tacked on the cork board.

Betty checked her inventory, making sure she had enough replacement jeans. She sent apology notes to each of her customers, and promised to ship the missing pairs overnight, free of charge. She may be cutting into her profits, but keeping customers happy was more important than the hundred and fifty or so dollars she’d just lost. A few bad reviews could ruin a small online business. She printed the labels, boxed the pants, and put the boxes by the door. She’d drive by the post office on the way to the basketball game. Hopefully, the line wouldn't be too long.

With an hour before she needed to leave, Betty decided to spend some time hunting for information on diabetes online. At the least, she needed to find a good recipe for dinner that night.

As always, her online search engine turned up with a host of sites. Most only offered cursory information on what diabetes was and how to prevent it.

From skimming those sites, she could see that the warning signs had been there for years. She’d always put the excess tiredness and crankiness down to being hungry, or not sleeping well, or… well, anything other than being sick. What would have happened if she’d paid attention to the warning signs? Would she have been able to prevent herself from diabetes?

Too late for that, she thought. So stop torturing yourself.

She typed "healthy diabetes food" into the search engine, hoping to turn up some more useful articles.

She found a whole online universe.

There were support groups, recipe websites, sites to track exercise and sites that translated medical terms into something easily understandable.

Then there were the inevitable rabbit holes. Explore one site that leads to something else that's interesting and then something even more fascinating shows up.

She discovered remarkable claims about adding just two servings of raw vegetables to a daily diet helping to lower blood sugar levels.

This was good news. She loved raw broccoli. Had loved it ever since she was a little girl. She would dip it into thousand island dressing and eat a bowlful of crowns (and half a bottle of dressing) but here were recipes for low carb low fat dressing!

Then she started reading about other effects of broccoli and wound up on a website proclaiming broccoli could protect the brain in the event of a head injury.

Well, that was good news. She already liked broccoli and was planning on banging her head against the nearest tree sometime in the very near future.

Unfortunately, not many other websites were helpful. Far too many of them focused on crash diets "cures" the doctors and pharmaceutical companies don't want you to know about and pills and other "solutions" that Betty was sure were more for profit than success. Then there were the myriad studies about herbal remedies that might be promising but it was all too much. She was just about ready to give up on the search for the day when she came across dlife.com. At that moment, Betty wished she could lean through the computer and hug whoever had created it.

This was exactly what she was looking for: an entire website on how to cope with and integrate care for diabetes into her life. They had everything, including an eitre section of the website devoted to recipes. She bookmarked a "Carb Safe" recipe to try and cook for dinner that night before grabbing the boxes and heading out the door for the basketball game.