Free Murder 101 by Maggie Barbieri Page A

loud welcome as we pulled into the station. The conductor brushed past me, knocking my briefcase off my lap and waking me up just in time. He screamed out the name of my stop. I sat up with a jolt and tried to grab the front of my briefcase before it hit the wet floor of the train car; a stray paper floated out and I snatched it from the gray puddle of muck in front of me in which it had landed. I read the name on top: Fiona Martin. Fiona would get a good grade just by virtue of the fact that I wouldn’t be able to read half of the drivel she wrote in the paper. The train stopped, and I lurched up from my seat and out the door onto the platform, not sure where I was, what had happened, or why my face was blazing hot.
    I sat on a bench to compose myself. I put Fiona’s paper back into my briefcase and rearranged everything else: my umbrella, my wallet, my keys, and my cell phone. I watched the train pull slowly out of the station. The river on the other side of the platform was calm and black, with a few large raindrops forming dimples on the wedge of water that was illuminated by the station’s bright lights. My hair was damp from the rain, so I pulled the hood of my raincoat up over my head and prepared to leave the station, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other and leaving dream analysis to another time.
    The only road out of the station went straight up. The first few days of my walk were horrendous as I adjusted to the length and pitch of the road. Now, after two weeks of walking, I was getting used to the steep slope and wasn’t even winded when I reached the top. I guess that was what was called “getting into shape.” I still felt like I needed a cigarette when I reached the top, just as a reward, but I had given up that nasty habit the year I had graduated from St. Thomas. I reached the top of the hill and looked at my watch: ten to seven. The deli at the end of my street would be open for another ten minutes, and I needed dinner. I started running down Broadway and reached the door three minutes later.
    Tony, the owner, and probably my future husband with the way things were going, was unplugging the meat slicer as I walked in, the bell on the door jangling and announcing my presence.
    “Mi amore!” Tony cried, so happy to see me that if he wasn’t so kind, I would be scared. “You just made it! I’m closing in two minutes.”
    “Hi, Tony,” I said, and took my hood off. I set my briefcase on the counter, opened it, and reached in for my wallet. “Can you make me a sandwich?”
    “The usual?” he asked, as he got out two slices of rye bread, chicken salad, and began assembling a sandwich for me.
    “Sure,” I said. Man, I have a usual. And a sixty-five-year-old, widowed, Italian boyfriend who knows what the usual is. But the sad fact was that Tony was more considerate of me and clearly more trustworthy than my ex-husband.
    I looked around. A big bag of potato chips, probably enough for a party of four, sat on the shelf behind me, just begging to be bought. I put it on the counter. I made my way to the refrigerator and reached in to take out a glass bottle of lemonade when a large can of Foster’s Lager caught my eye. The Foster’s cans looked like minikegs. For your maximum drinking pleasure, I guess. I had never had a can of Foster’s in my life and the only beer that I had had in the last twenty years was the one I gulped down with Max at Maloney’s a few days ago. I figured now was the time to be adventurous. I grabbed not one, but two cans, enjoying the feel of their squat roundness in my hands. They were cold and a little wet. I put one of them to my head and then on the counter, along with the potato chips.
    Tony brought my sandwich over and eyed the cans suspiciously. “Having company?” he asked, looking slightly jealous. He punched a few numbers into the register.
    “Uh . . . no . . . well, maybe,” I lied, and took a twenty out of my wallet. Just want to get