The whole town’s buzzing after – you’ll never guess – the bus driver was arrested for murder. The bus driver! It’s hard to believe that the guy who drove our kids to school, volunteered at every potluck could do such a thing. It’s hard enough to swallow that he’s an alcoholic – he was apparently so drunk they thought he took a horse tranquilizer – but a killer, too? We trusted a drunk with our kids! We welcomed this man into our homes! He had walked across hallowed ground and prayed with us!

You know him: Thomas McGhee. You went to his graduation party a few years back. The news says he murdered the entire family of the new pediatrician in town, except she really isn’t new. She grew up here, left for college, got married, then came back with her new name over a decade later and a shiny, custom made, mahogany frame to show off her expensive PhD. My youngest son – James, you were there for his baptism – had his first appointment with her just two days before she lost everything. She seems nice, but who really knows anymore? Especially after we learned we know so little about Thomas.

I have it on good authority – I talked to the pastor’s wife who’s Tom’s godmother, yes, you know her, you met her the other Christmas when Jodie was part of the nativity play – that Dr Wilkins was Tom’s tutor, back before she went ‘galavanting’ off. She made her pocket money helping kids with their science work. My ‘source’ says he adored her and had a complete temper tantrum for over a month once she left. And that he became the angriest McGhee, which was saying something, since his great uncle has been in jail for domestic violence several times. I guess it runs in the family.

Jessica, the owner of Peoria’s Petit Patisserie – we ate there last month for your birthday when you came to visit – says she saw Tom and Dr Wilkins meet up the first Monday after the new office opened. Tom seemed absolutely ‘flabbergasted’ to see Dr Wilkins and hung around her like a fluffy kitty to someone with a terrible allergy. Dr Wilkins needed to get back to work but he kept blocking the door, demanding they have lunch. She said no, that she had patients waiting. He begged and begged and begged until she finally gave in and said okay, but that it would have to be a late lunch on Thursday since that’s when she does half days. Jess says she’s never seen Tom happier than when he walked out that door.

Thursday came and the two showed up at Big Bernard’s Hot Grill and Bar – we ate there last summer for my birthday cause hubby dearest decided he wanted ribs and a beer. Well, they were seated in Kathy’s section, which she remembers fondly – at first – since she’d been Dr Wilkins’s babysitter way back when. She’d also been mine, and let me tell you what, there is not a stricter yet kinder woman in all of Peoria. At least, when it comes to children.

So they chatted it up, and Kathy remembers Tom getting almost instantly unpleasant to her, and even getting snippy with Dr Wilkins. Until she walked away, that is. Then Tom buttered up the poor woman, talking about how beautiful she is and how she’s the light of his life. Kathy says it sounded more like a one sided conversion of a lovestruck teenager. Kathy says she wanted to stick around, since Dr Wilkins seemed uncomfortable, but Tom gave her ‘the ick’ – I think Kathy is hanging around too many high schoolers but I guess that comes with the territory of being a single mom to one and all you do in your free time is be surrounded by them – and couldn’t even stand to stand near him.

Kathy says it got worse once the bill came. Dr Wilkins wanted to split it but Tom insisted on paying, then asked to see her again. She tried to dance around the idea, saying she was busy with work and all, but Tom wouldn’t let her say no. Then she mentioned her kids and how her little boy has got pee-wee soccer on Saturdays and leadline horse shows on odd Sundays, and Kathy said it was like a switch flipped in his head and he went all sorts of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Tom got pissed she had kids. He started screaming about how they’re meant to be, and how dare she cheat on him, and how he’s been waiting for her, and how she’s broken her promise. Kathy didn’t get a chance to move in before the manager swooped in and became Dr Wilkins’s human shield. He took Tom into the private dining room – the one with the really nice chandelier that we totally didn’t steal crystals off of during my bachelorette – and Kathy escorted Dr Wilkins out. The poor girl was shaken and had to call her husband to pick her up.

That explains why Tom started being late to pick up. He seemed drowsy at the time, like he wasn’t getting enough sleep. I had no idea he was hungover or I would’ve never let Jodie and James ride that bus. I would’ve driven them myself. My work didn’t start til noon anyways. Oh! I got a new job as a part-time data entry specialist, which is just about as boring as it sounds. 

Anyways, I thought he had become a recent soda addict with all the half-drunk Pepsi bottles that filled every spare crevice he had up front. According to the cops, it was Jim Beam. He’d been drinking and driving my precious babies all around town! I was ready to kill him myself when Roberta told me. I’d probably still want to kill him if he ever shows his ugly mug around me again!

Speaking of Roberta, she saw Tom outside Dr Wilkins’s clinic about a week before he killed her family. The doc tried to book it to her car and lock him out, but he shoved his hand in and got it crushed. No broken bones, but he did milk that until she agreed to talk. ‘Just talk.’ Roberta says he offered couples counseling for them, since he wanted to get past the fact she’s been cheating on him and married the affair partner, and has his ‘bastards,’ and that he’d be willing to step up and ‘be the dad they deserved.’ Dr Wilkins looked about ready to cry. But Roberta’s hubby, Officer Callahan – yeah the same one that stripped at your bachelorette – showed up to pick her up for their dinner date. Officer Callahan stepped in and Tom scurried off after a huffing match that Roberta called ‘the most pathetic verbal big dick contest’ she’d ever seen.

Apparently, Tom had booked it to Quick Liquor and stocked up on a bunch of Bud Light. He told Billy – no, not your ex, the other Billy that would’ve gotten a full lacrosse scholarship if he hadn’t been in the car wreck that took half his left leg – that he was having a party that weekend. Billy said it was odd, since he’d always been invited to Tom’s parties, and he even admitted it stung a bit to be left out, and that he felt all gross and vomit-y after he realized what he was getting jealous over after the fact.

That Friday, Officer Callahan pulled Tom over for going under the speed limit. Roberta says it was her hub’s first time ever doing that, cause he was going like 10 in a 40 without his hazards on. They were a block from Dr Wilkins’s place and Tom kept staring off at the corner house while Officer Callahan took his details. Tom failed a breathalyzer and his car got towed. It was Tom’s first offense so he got a ticket and a night in ‘jail’ to sober up. Maybe it was because he had that moment of sobriety that Tom was able to form a semi-coherent plan of action. Maybe Officer Callahan had inadvertently spurred on a spurned lover. Cause that night, that Saturday night, after he was released, is when Tom broke into the Wilkins residence.

The newspaper says he’d broken in with a screwdriver and then swiped an antique pistol from the gun cabinet Stephen – Mr Wilkins, bless his heart – had in the living room. It says there were only 3 bullets loaded, which was ‘lucky’ for Dr Wilkins. Not sure how ‘lucky’ she could be when all 3 ended up in the chest of her toddler son. Or when the screwdriver was found with both ends poking out of her infant daughter – not even 2 months old, the poor dear. Stephen was – God rest his soul – ‘fileted’ in front of Dr Wilkins.

Tom had apparently tied the doctor up and made sure she watched the slow death of her beloved. That’s what Eileen – the lead EMT, and the same girl you kissed when you both failed to remember senior skip day and then ditched the next day to get drunk in her dad’s basement – says. She says Dr Wilkins kept rambling on about what Tom made her watch: peeling his skin off with a steak knife; draining his blood into a bucket before smearing it all over Dr Wilkins’s chest in a ragged heart shape; and finally stabbing him repeatedly – especially in those, you know, sensitive bits – and letting him bleed out. Eileen says it’s a hard thing to watch, the light fading slowly from someone’s eyes, that it’s bad enough when she can’t save a stranger, that she can only imagine what it’s like to see it all from someone you love.

Dr Wilkins managed to get away and made it to a neighbor’s house – Teresa, you haven’t met her, she moved in two months ago, but you knew her crotchety old uncle who left her the house, cause he’s the one that got you arrested for jaywalking of all things – who called 911 for her. Teri says Dr Wilkins couldn’t get a single word out. She was just a blubbering mess covered in blood. Teri couldn’t even tell if it was Dr Wilkins’ or someone else’s.

There was no sign of Tom when Officer Callahan finally pulled up. But it didn’t take long to find the guy swerving through traffic on the interstate, heading north. The news says he ran over spike strips – the ones intended to stop cars in their tracks – but kept on going until there was no rubber left round the rims. The news copter caught the sparks flying off once the wheels were nothing but metal. It took a barricade of police cars to stop the guy. And even then, he crashed head first into one. A cop ended up sandwiched between the two, but the sonuva gun managed to make it out with a barely fractured hip and some puncture wounds. His guardian angel must’ve been extra diligent that night. 

Tom was immediately arrested and shipped off to the local hospital in shackles, although the news says he was unconscious on arrival. And at that point, little Lily – Dr Wilkins’s little daughter – was still in critical care. She didn’t make it long past that, though.

It took a couple days before Dr Wilkins made a public statement, thanking everyone for the support in these difficult times, and asking everyone for privacy as she grieves for her family. We mostly listened, except we had to make sure her fridge was well stocked in lasagnas and casseroles. Lorraine – the neighbor’s girlfriend, who you’d love since she knits just as fast as you crochet – is helping Dr Wilkins plan the funerals. And by ‘help’ I mean that Lorraine is planning everything and Dr Wilkins just gives her the credit card info. Teri helps too: she keeps the house clean and mows the lawn. No one is looking forward to this funeral, but I know everyone is going to be there. Jessica and Big Bernard’s are catering the thing, free of charge. 

I think everyone has a little bit of guilt in them. No one really stood up for the woman or her family along the way. Jess says she wishes she had the gall to kick Tom out when he wouldn’t stop badgering Dr Wilkins. Kathy says she should’ve stepped in and nipped his buttering in the bud and not waited for the manager. Roberta wishes she hadn’t waited for her hubs to show up. They said that maybe, as a combined force, they could’ve stopped Tom in his tracks and forced him to see the errors of his ways. I told them that we could’ve tried til we turned blue but that I have it on good authority that Tom often has a one track mind and can’t see the forest through the trees.

Now, you gotta keep a secret for me, okay? That authority – the one who knows how little Tom’s mind gets stuck on repeat when he means to hit shuffle on a six cd changer – is me. Luckily, my mom insisted she keep her maiden name and pass it along. Last of her family or something. Familial pride? Not sure. Not like it would’ve mattered since Dad skipped out on us before I was even born and gaslit Mom into thinking she was a one night stand and that she’d slept around so she couldn’t even be sure of my paternity anyways. 

But Tom was given our dad’s name. His mom didn’t care so much about the already messed up legacy it had, or the fact that Dad had two women already chasing him for court mandated DNA tests and child support. Thank the heavens she was that kind of woman, or I’d likely be drowning in reporters.

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