Free A Killing Spring by Gail Bowen

a Dolly Parton wig …”
    After these fevered images of Sodom and Gomorrah, the actual fire escape seemed disappointingly mundane. It was a rickety metal affair that zigzagged from the back alley to the third floor, an eyesore that had been added on as a sop to some busybody at City Hall who took fire regulations seriously. Utilitarian as it was, it had done the job. It had taken Reed Gallagher where he wanted to go. I walked over to thefoot of it, and for a few minutes I stood there looking up through the dizzying height of steps into the pale March sky. When I started back across the yard, I met an old man with a walker. He was moving with exquisite slowness, but as I passed him, he stopped and grabbed my arm. His voice was raspy whisper. “Did you hear what happened in there?”
    “Yes,” I said, “I heard.”
    He pulled me so close I could feel his breath on my face. “Men who don women’s clothing are an abomination to God,” he said, then he continued his methodical passage towards the site of the abomination.
    After such a chilling insight into how a fellow being saw the heart of God, an afternoon reading the dry legal language of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms was a relief. When Angus came home at 4:00, I told him that, as a reward for babysitting on a Saturday night, he could choose the dinner menu. He decided on sandwiches from the Italian Star deli, an easy call for me, so after I picked up the mortadella and provolone, I had time for a quick nap before I showered and dressed. I was just fastening the turquoise and silver necklace Alex had given me for Christmas when Taylor came in and sat on my bed. Benny was in her arms, but her eyes were anxious.
    I sat down beside her. “Taylor, in all the time since you came to live with us, have I ever not come home?”
    “No,” she said. “But what if … ?”
    “What if what?” I asked.
    She shook her head dolefully. “I don’t know,” she murmured.
    I drew her close to me. “Taylor, life is full of what-ifs, but if you spend all your time being afraid of them, there’s not much time left over for being happy, and I want you to be happy.”
    “I am happy,” she whispered. “That’s why I’m scared of what if …”
    Twenty minutes later as I walked through Wascana Park towards the Nationtv studios, Taylor was still at the forefront of my thoughts. She’d come to the front door to wave to me when I left. She’d been hugging Benny to her, and doing her best. It was a worry, but it was a worry that was going to have to wait. I took a deep breath and started mentally running through the clauses relating to sexual orientation in the Charter. I was trying to remember the three key points of a bill on homosexual rights that had been defeated in the Ontario legislature when I realized I’d turned onto a path that had a degree of fame in our city.
    The old campus of our university is on the northern edge of the park. It’s a serene setting for the handsome pair of buildings that once housed our entire university, but which are now given over to the departments of Music, Drama, and Art. The path I walked along ran behind the buildings. By day, it was a place where students gravitated for a smoke, young mums wheeled strollers, dog-walkers walked dogs, and joggers jogged. But at night, the path changed character. After dark, it was a cruising park for gay men. The students at the university called it “the Fruit Loop.” So, in my private thoughts, did I. More sticks and stones.
    When I got to Nationtv, I went, as I always did, to makeup, where Tina, who had taught me that if I wanted a clean lip-line after the age of forty, I had to use lip-liner, and that I would be insane to buy any eye shadow more expensive than Maybelline, was waiting for me. As she swept blush along my cheeks, I looked at my reflection in the mirror. Despite my nightly slatherings of Oil of Olay, it was clear that Father Time was undefeated. I shrugged, turned away