Page 4 of Mad Mabel

“Everywhere,” she says. “Oh! And Teddy’s yiayia didn’t even haveTVwhen she was little!” She frowns, considering this a moment. “She must have watched her phone.”

“Or her iPad?” Daphne offers.

It occurs to me that Persephone has been thrust into my life by virtue of some sort of karmic force. As you know, I haven’t been a perfect citizen. And yet, I would be hard-pressed to find a hardened criminal of the worst variety who was deserving of this kind of torture.

“You know who you should interview?” I said, in a moment of genius. “Ishaan!”

Ishaan, who is ninety-three, is my nemesis. He has lived next door for twenty-five years. He lived with Old Jim until five years ago when Jim died.Mates, Jim and Old Ishaan used to say whenever their living arrangements came up.We’re mates from university days.As if I cared what Old Ishaan and Jim got up to. After Jim died, some bright spark decided to give Ishaan a demonic Chihuahua to keep him company. Ishaan has aged a lot since Old Jim died. The only time I see him these days is when he shuffles outside in his brown terry cloth robe to retrieve his vitamin deliveries. (Ishaan has never met a vitamin he didn’t like. He is forever ordering them on iHerb. Fine by me, it is a free country after all. If he wants to give his last remaining dollars to charlatans for the privilege of turning his piss yellow, I wish him well.)

“He’s dead,” Persephone says.

Daphne and I exchange a look. “I beg your pardon?”

“Dead,” she says louder. “D. E. D.”

“How do you know?”

“Because,” she says impatiently, “he didn’t answer when I knocked on the door before.”

“So you assumed he was dead?” Daphne says.

“He’sold,” Persephone says. It was as if she were trying to explain math to a pair of stupid children. “You said so yourself. Old people die.”

“Old people also take naps,” I tell her, looking toward Ishaan’s.

“But his boxes of vitamins are piled up on the doorstep,” Persephone says.

“Nuggethasbeen barking more than usual,” Daphne adds.

I sigh, then heave myself out of my chair.

“Where are you going?” Persephone calls after me.

“Where do you think I’m going? I’m going to check if Ishaan is dead.”

“But we have an interview to do!”

“I’ll tell you one thing, if the old bastard has even a breath left in him, he’s going to do this bloody interview.”

“And what if he is dead?” Persephone asks.

I pause. “Then I’ll kill him.”

I really shouldn’t say stuff like that. It’s those kinds of comments that can land a girl in hot water. I should know.

Have you ever noticed there are two types of postal workers? There are the extremely helpful kind. The ones who pat the dogs, stow the package somewhere out of the rain, wait the extra minutefor the elderly people to get to the door. And then there’s Dwayne, our postman.

Dwayne, if you don’t mind. Not Wayne. Not Dane. Dwayne. As if his mother had a stroke while filling in his birth certificate and the scrawl next to the nameWaynelooked a little like a D.

As I arrive at Ishaan’s gate, Dwayne pulls up on his scooter and retrieves a small square box from his satchel. More vitamins, no doubt.

“Not home?” Dwayne asks.

I point to the small pile of boxes already on Ishaan’s doormat. “Apparently not. I can take it.”

“Can’t. Needs to be signed for.”

For pity’s sake. As if someone is going to steal his bloody vitamins.