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A Good Girl with a Hatchet

by Laura Ellen Scott

About the Author: Laura Ellen Scott is the author of the novels Death Wishing (Ig Publishing, 2011) and The Juliet (Pandamoon Publishing, 2016). Portions of "A good Girl with a Hatchet" will appear in her next novel, The Mean Bone in Her Body, the first book in the New Royal Mysteries, due out later this year from Pandamoon Publishing.

Excerpt

Somehow I got a free ride, despite my past. No more pushing the library trolley on the work-study plan. I was promoted to Research Assistant to Professor Murgatroyd, and the beauty of it was that Murgatroyd wasn’t even around. She was gone to the UK for the term, so I came and went as I pleased. And I had THE KEYS. To her office, to her house, to her car … either I gave off a Trusty vibe, or Doc M’s so badass that she wasn’t prejudiced against the hatchet. It was probably both.

She emailed once a week:

Check the mail.

Start the car, let it run 10 min.

Scan [some sheep farmer’s bullshit file] and send to me.

The emails were all biz, like we’d never met. The way she was sometimes made me think she had a secret identity.  

Once, I was relaxing on her bed, and I saw the closet was open a crack, so I texted her: Closet door open. After an hour she replied: Look under the bed. Took me a second to realize she was messing with me. She was cool like that. Sometimes.

To be honest, Doc M was the only person I was close to, if intimacy means you can go through someone’s things.  

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