Deadly Fall by Susan Calder

pressed her son for details.
    â€œDimitri doesn’t need this with parliament starting up next week.”
    They left the treadmills for the elliptical machines. Paula was glad to see some sweat matting Anne’s ash-blond bangs. Anne returned to the “shock” and “unbelievable” words that were starting to sound like platitudes. “I shudder at the thought of Callie jogging alone in the dark,” Anne said. “I don’t much like that creepy area behind the Stampede grounds in daytime, never mind at night.”
    â€œCallie didn’t tend to worry about such things.” Another non-Anne trait.
    Anne pressed her machine settings. Paula punched her elliptical panel up two levels. The machines were good for channeling stress. Much of her talk during their tri-weekly workouts involved venting, mainly hers about work, her daughters, parking tickets, incompetent repairmen . . . Anne was a good listener. In the old days, when she and Callie worked out, Callie had listened, too, but was more likely to tell her off. “Get over it,” she would say, “Don’t be judgmental, see it from his or her point of view.” Clearly, at the end of her life, Callie was looking to her for help with a problem that may or may not have been related to the murder. If Paula was in crisis, who would she turn to? Hayden, unless the problem was him. She didn’t have many girlfriends. The ones she had acquired after her divorce had remarried and drifted away or stalled in the bitterness. In terms of hours spent together, Anne was probably her current best friend, although they never met outside the fitness center. Of the two, Paula would rather pour her crisis to Callie, despite their distance in recent years. She wiped an eye.
    â€œWhat’s the matter?” Anne said.
    â€œShe’s gone. There’s no one in my life to replace her.”
    Two minute cool down scrolled across the elliptical panel. Anne maintained her pedaling pace. She always worked vigorously to the end.
    â€œMy best memories of Callie are of us being silly,” Paula said. “Like that night we went out drinking to celebrate my divorce. I told you about that. We wound up running along Stephen Avenue downtown shouting, ‘Death to all husbands.’ I can’t believe I did that, even when drunk.”
    â€œYou stumbled into a cop and collapsed in hysterics.”
    â€œHe threatened to drag us off to jail. Instead, he put us in a cab and sent us home. I told him drunkenly he’d restored my faith in men.”
    Paula stepped off the elliptical machine. “Now that she’s dead, all my petty jealousies seem like a waste of time. I was even jealous of Leah’s preference for her, that year after we moved to Calgary. I’m glad I forgot about that when the detectives were grilling me.”
    Anne led them to ab-cruncher. “I’m sure Leah didn’t prefer her—
    â€œShe rubbed it in about how much more fun Callie was, more like a friend than—”
    â€œNormal teenage rebellion,” Anne said.
    They lay down on the benches and moved up and down in sync.
    â€œLeah blamed me for dragging her here, away from all her friends in Montreal,” Paula said. “She let Gary off the hook, although it was as much his fault.”
    â€œKids are never fair,” Anne said.
    Even at the time, Paula understood Leah’s need to heap all the blame on her, so she wouldn’t feel betrayed by both parents. It didn’t stop Paula from being hurt, and holding back anger wasn’t her strong suit. She pulled her body higher to attack her abdominal muscles. So many words she would take back, so much she would change. “I wish I’d said ‘screw work’ and gone with Leah, Callie, and Skye for that girls’ week in Palm Springs. It would have been fun to have had that time together. I might have got grunge.”
    Anne turned sideways, her