As we rejoin Emily she's waking up, felling like crap. I guess shock will do that to you. She takes a shower and gets dressed, "pretending to glamour" with her streaky, too long hair. I have no idea what "pretending to glamour" means. And you know, I have absolutely no idea what this woman looks like. With all the other description we've gotten I'd think she could have spared a sentence or two about herself. I'm not even sure how her hair is streaked. Brown and gray? Blue and green? No idea. Maybe it's yellow since she throws on a "clean yellow cotton sweater" and gets into her yellow Jeep. Well, I'm glad she told us her shirt was clean. I was worried there for a minute.
She heads into town bitching about potholes and stopping for turkeys to be courteous. Except that it's kind of the law to stop for turkeys around here so courtesy doesn't really enter into it. She thinks that the turkey is bitching at her. Emily seems to have a real problem with thinking animals are thinking about her. And for wanting "mindless nature" she seems to hate wildlife.
This Turkey is Judging You
Ooh, now we get a description of the town. Yay! She calls it a mid-sized village. Which calls to mind something fairly small. But, here's the layout: Two grocery stores, an IGA and a Mom and Pop sounding place. A library, an ammo store, a restaurant named Fuller's EATS (naturally) owned by a woman with a penchant for genealogy. Except that all her in-laws seem to be outlaws and ne'er-do-wells (I only mention this because it will pop up again, in one of my major annoyances of the book), A candy shop that has been busted for porn, a funeral home that sounds suspiciously like an actual one in a neighboring town (in real life), a beauty shop (which Emily doesn't trust, saving her hairstyling for Traverse City, the only town that can cut hair correctly, I guess), a barber shop with scary men smoking inside and a lot of Michigan Militia literature and a cigar store Indian (Native-American) outside. She ruminates a bit about the wisdom of offending the Native-Americans in the area who are getting wealthy and powerful off the casinos. I'm paraphrasing, but not by much. Which leads her to another offensive rumination that the locals
"take pride in their independence of thought, right along with the busted couches sitting on their front porches, their pickups with full gun racks, and their groaning deer pole every November."
Because saying people have trashy houses isn't rude at all. And gun racks are actually pretty rare around here though I will plead guilty to the deer thing. Except, Emily, you forgot bow season. Tsk tsk. I'm sure if she had remembered she would have been snarky about that as well.
There is also a feed store, a mechanic, a Five & Dime, a resale shop, a bakery, post office (a U.S. post office, no less) and some kind of wood product place which employs most of the town. There's also a bar called The Skunk Saloon, a bowling alley, three churches, a bank (that is horrible as well, Traverse City is apparently better at banking too) and the combination Police and Fire Station, to which she is now headed.
Sorry to inflict all that on you but that sounds like a pretty good-sized town to me. And I mostly mention it because Emily tells us that she loves planning her trips to town. Even though she doesn't seem to like or use any of it, preferring Traverse City.
And a mention about the bank. There are two towns closer to her fictional Leetsville that have perfectly fine banks and services. Kalkaska and Mancelona. But since I think she made up her town out of bits and pieces of those two towns then she chooses to ignore them. I could be wrong, however, we'll see if they get deemed worth a mention.
Anywho, Emily arrives at the Police Station to find a state police officer ( I somehow feel that should be capitalized but she didn't so I'm not going to). They all get introduced and we're told Officer Brent (the trooper) has a shaved head and unibrow, because, of course. Then Chief Lucky actually uses the word Mrs. as opposed to Miz and I get happy thinking that maybe E.K.B. deemed him smart after all but no, he's back to saying Miz the next sentence. Geez, at least be consistent with your bizarre dialect choices, Elizabeth. And, I swear, I have never heard anyone use the word 'Miz' before. It seems like she just grabbed a random redneck accent to use. WE DON'T TALK LIKE THAT! Sorry for the yelling but it had to be done.
She starts interrogating them for her article and the Chief goes along with it for a bit. Mostly just stuff about if he told the family (one daughter, a refined, delicate lady, gag). He also tells her that a search will be on for the rest of the lady. After pumping him for info she then politely informs him that she's covering it for her paper. Then Super Trooper pipes up telling her that she will have to get any of her information from the Gaylord State Police post. Ok, I'm not 100% on this but I do know that there is a State Police post in Kalkaska. Emily says that the one in Gaylord is the main one however. Since this could be accurate I'll defer to her. This time.
Emily answers some questions until Deputy Dolly interrupts by telling the trooper he'd be better off letting the locals handle the investigation because they know everybody and know all the local feuds. Which seems reasonable to me. Super Trooper thinks so too because a bar fight gone bad in Petoskey is much more interesting than a severed head. Ok?? I have the feeling that a bar fight shooting would be a local matter but that a severed head would be state but who am I to argue with the Gods of Contrivance?
Emily decides to leave and go to the local gossip mill, Fuller's EATS. I'm not yelling. That's the way it's written. She knows that everybody knows everybody back to their great-granddaddies and speculates that people there would know based on the perpetrator's lineage. In a conversation that uses more Generic Redneck Speak:
"Goes back to 'is great-grandfather, Chilton. I remember the man. Tipped over the Johnson's outhouse one Halloween and never had the gumption to admit to it. Bad, right from then on. Coward, you might say. Fun is fun, but telling the truth is something else..."
Outhouse tipping! That sounds almost as fun as cow tipping! Ugh.
So, off to Fuller's EATS!
End of Chapter
And so winds up another exciting chapter of stereotyping and Emily pondering on animals gossiping about her.
Next Tuesday we'll find out what exciting things she learns at Fuller's EATS. And if she thinks their food is edible. My guess is it doesn't compare to Traverse City. And don't forget that Sunday is Teen Horror Sunday and we'll start another chapter of The Locker by Richie Tankersley Cusick. In which more fun things will probably happen than in this book.
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