The Second Doublewide on the Right, part 16

I’m Fixin’ To present part 16 of The Second Doublewide on the Right:

Candy Sue Collins, sitting next to Ocmulgee County Deputy Sheriff James Earl Murphy’s desk in his small office, was astounded when the deputy indicated they wouldn’t have to go through the arduous task of getting an arrest warrant and a restraining order on her ex-husband. “Why-why, whatever do you mean?” she asked.

“It appears there is already an outstanding arrest warrant for him,” the deputy informed her as he peered at his computer screen. “It seems he was convicted of stealing a lot of money from his employers in Michigan, and was sentenced to five years probation and ordered to make restitution. According to this information he violated his probation by failure to make that restitution and failure to report to his probation officer.”

“Wh-what does all that mean?” Candy Sue asked the deputy as her hopes soared.

“It means if he’s picked up he’ll be held in jail without bond until the state of Michigan extradites him. However, I’ll proceed with getting an arrest warrant on him on your charges so that if he is extradited and ever returns to Georgia, we’ll be waiting on him. In the meantime, he’ll more than likely make a wrong turn or something. Can you give me a description of the vehicle he’s driving?”

She did, and also furnished him with the Michigan license plate number.

Deputy Murphy looked up from the pad he had been taking notes on and asked, “May I contact you by cell phone with any result that come up, Miss Collins?”

“Uh huh, you may, and you can always find me at my trailer in Shady Grove, or either at my restaurant at Apt-To-Miss.”

Candy Sue was thrilled that Deputy Murphy walked her all the way to her car. As he held her car door open for her he said, “My shift goes till midnight and I’ll make sure no vehicle with a Michigan license plate comes near your trailer.”

She made sure that an ample potion of her lovely legs made an appearance as she slid into her car seat, and just before she closed the door said, “It would be nice if you called me sometime tonight, you know, just to give me an update.” She pulled the car door closed and was so pleased as she observed through her rear view mirror that he stood in that one spot looking after her until she went out of sight.

Not long after Candy Sue left the Ocmulgee County Sheriff’s Office the word went out. It wasn’t an official “Be on the Lookout” directive, but just a few code words used between police officers that spread like wildfire. The result was that around nine o’clock that evening a car bearing Michigan plates turned into the parking lot of a sports bar without using a turn signal. Less than an hour later Candy Sue’s problem was solved when her ex-husband was booked and incarcerated in the Ocmulgee County Detention Center on an outstanding warrant from Lansing, Mich.

Candy Sue was still tingling all over when she got back to her trailer in Shady Grove, where she took a quick shower and slipped into a tee-shirt and a pair of jeans, and dined on some leftovers from today’s lunch. Later on she checked the lock on her front door, and just to be extra safe she jammed a chair back underneath the handle of it. She had curled up on the sofa and dozed off when the tone of her cell phone awakened her and she received the good news from Deputy Murphy. “Oh my God!” she squealed, “what can I do to thank you?”

“How about feeding me lunch tomorrow?” he had replied.

This had all happened two months prior to the Thursday when Granny’s Kitchen menu featured the chicken fried steak and pork chops. Candy Sue had an early customer that day. It had been Quantavious, the black guy who everybody suspected of being a dope dealer that lived in the last trailer in the park. And he had given her something she had been hinting around about for weeks. For a tip, he had slipped her two joints, which she had slipped into the pocket of her apron, the one James Earl liked to watch her walk around in with nothing else on.

Then that Lecherous old landlord, Leon, had come in. She was nice to him, but she couldn’t stand the way he stared at her. James Earl had told her he would figure out a way to bust him, but she had told him no, because she needed him since he controlled the property.

She had fixed both Leon and James Earl’s plates back in the kitchen and took them out at the same time. Then she had gone back to the deputy’s table to take him his iced tea. While she poured tea with one hand her other slipped into her apron pocket and curled around the two joints, which she then palmed to the deputy and whispered, “Here’s what you was fixin’ to want me to get!”