Hear How They Scream (Chapter One)

1

Bad Coffee, Long Nights, and James Brown

July 17^th, 1978

Detroit, Michigan

Don’t matter how long you’ve been with the department…you never get used to dredging bodies up from the river. Especially when they’re kids. It was 1978; Ray London was a junior detective with the Detroit Metropolitan Police Department back then. Michigan was a violent place, the Murder Mitten, the home of Mo-Town, the Motor City, and drive-bys.

In a sense, by this point in his career, Ray had been hardened a bit; such is the nature of the beast. While it never became any easier he had grown accustomed to seeing death. People gunned down over disputes in their driveways, the murdered convenience store clerk who just happened to working the unlucky shift, the medical technician shot over drugs in the back of the ambulance, the drunken husband who pushed his wife just a little too hard, he’d seen it all, everything the gritty city had to offer.

But not this…

Jesus Christ, nothing like this yet…

She was young, late teens, Hispanic descent; at least…that’s what Ray assumed anyway. It was truly hard to tell. Decomposition and gas buildup from her riverbed burial had caused her features to become pallid and unrecognizable. The smell was almost unbearable, like being trapped at the bottom of an outhouse while the gizzards of month old Mackerel were being dumped down upon you by the metric ton.

Did I mention the outhouse was in full use?

Death had an awful odor to it. One that most couldn’t handle.

On his way over to the crime scene he’d seen two officers standing in the lot by their patrol car, retching their morning pastries and coffees into the dirt.

He’d been that guy once.

But today he was this guy.

“How long?”

His partner, Radley “Red” Christen, sighed deeply, “since last night.”

Ray nodded. His wavy blonde hair bobbed but naturally his neatly parted locks stayed in place. Some of the people at the department called him “Paige Boy”, still, he liked the haircut. “What’d she have to say?”

Red shrugged. “She just packed up and left. Didn’t say shit.”

That was them.

Standing over the bloated corpse of teenage girl and they were talking about Red’s marriage.

“Just give it time man.”

Red shook his head and shoved his gorilla sized hands into the pockets of his pinstriped blue trousers. The man loved the color blue, everything from his eyes down to his shoes were blue.

Except for his name…which was in direct contrast…

Weird that…

He pulled the blue Fedora off his head and wiped the July heat from his sweating brow. His jet black hair was matted down against the top of his skull. The heat made the girl’s stench all the more excruciating. Sad he was so calloused that even at a time like this he was thinking of himself and his selfish olfactory senses.

They didn’t know.

Neither one of them knew the Motor City was about to be rocked by a vicious serial killer.

How could they have known?

How could they have fathomed the sociopath already had another poor young girl chained in a Motel on 8 Mile fifteen miles from the river bank where they stood now? It’s simple, mathematical; the killer had already run the numbers.

They couldn’t.

So in that July heat, that late afternoon in 1978, two very competent but clueless detectives pondered over the death of the girl that lay at their feet.

“Do we have a name?”

The coroner was jotting something down on a piece of paper next to the body. He wore a mask over his face as he poked and prodded the victim with his blue rubber gloved hands. “Angelique Martíz. Sophomore. My guess is around fifteen to sixteen years old. Found her backpack over there by some brush. Had this in it.” He tossed a bracelet to them and diverted his gaze from the officers to a thicket of brambles further downstream and pointed. On the ground was a heavily used and dreadfully soiled blue and yellow backpack, next to a yellow number “3” marking it as evidence on the ground.

Red caught the homemade bracelet and looked at it briefly before his lip curled in a dreadful expression. He held it out, in black and white beads was embroidered “Angelique Martíz”.

“Thanks Tony.”

Tony nodded and went back to work. Ray and Red walked over to the backpack and Ray bent down to examine it. He opened it up, a couple of books, some homework, some loose papers.

There were pens. There were pencils.

There were even erasers.

But there was unfortunately no motive.

“I’ll never understand some sickos.” Muttered Red shaking his mountain of a head. He turned his gaze back to the corpse lying on the ground. Ray’s eyes were fixated on something else altogether.

“Hey, what’s that?” Called Ray pointing into the thicket of brush. There was a cube shaped object, half covered by ferns and muck, with a cord running from the top of it. “Looks like a tape player.”

“Might’ve been the girl’s?”

That’s what Ray was thinking. Carefully avoiding falling into the river he traversed the slope down into the brambles and retrieved his prize. A Sony cassette player with a wooden panel finish. One of the nice ones.

One of the expensive ones.

Perhaps it was bigoted of Ray but he didn’t see the teenage Hispanic girl having an extra hundred bucks lying around just to listen to her tapes on the go. As he picked it up a pair of headphones came dredging up from the water behind him. There was a note taped to them.

Ray reeled the cord in and called over to Red, “Hey! I got something down here!” The note was wrapped in a plastic bag, it had clearly been the intention of whoever left it behind to make it more difficult to find. Scrawled in barely legible, crude black ink was “To Whom It May Concern…”

What the hell does that mean? Thought Ray as Red moved down the bank to join his partner. The slope and the man’s freakishly long legs made the journey more perilous than Ray’s, not to mention he wouldn’t want to soil his pretty blue suit in the murky waters of the Detroit River. “Whatcha got?”

Ray held the headphones out, handwriting up to his partner who took it from him. He read the note intently with his steely gaze, absorbing it, Red could be extraordinarily serious when need be. He however chose to exercise his sense of joviality instead. “I guess that’s us. Think it’s a number one single?”

Ray’s tone was much grimmer than his partners.

“Let’s just hope this guy’s a one hit wonder…”

The tape was terrifying.

Two of the rookies had to step away from the car because it made them sick.

The same ones who threw up at the sight of the corpse.

But Ray couldn’t blame them for either shortcoming. The contents of the cassette were deeply disturbing. The voice of who they assumed was Angelique Martíz was prevalent. She screamed for help, her audible sobs of anguish and futility tore into Ray’s chest as if he were being sliced apart on an operating table.

Without anesthesia…

Yeah…it hurt…

There was the sound of a drill. More panic. The terrible sound of cracking bones. It was awful.

But there was another sound too. It sounded like classical music. Bach? Beethoven perhaps? He wasn’t sure. He could decipher that twisted aspect later. For now he listened to the sound of a frightened teenage girl.

“Why?” The horrified voice of Angelique was cracking. The irony of tears is how wet they left the face but dry they rendered the throat. Through choking gasps she continued, “Why are you doing this to me!? I don’t even know you…please…ple-e-a-se…” The last word was drawn out.

More screaming.

More crying. More begging.

Red hit stop.

The two men sat in silence in the front seat of the patrol car for a minute, trying to make sense of what they had just heard. Ray’s head was spinning. She didn’t know her kidnapper, he made a cassette tape of her murder, and he had neatly packaged it up for the officer’s to find. It was a game to whoever did this.

“This is bad Ray.”

“I know Red.”

The two men drove off in silence.

They moved from neighborhood to neighborhood, making sure to check both the nice sides of town with crooked but rich bankers and the not so desirable pieces of real estate laden with angry gangbangers and fat prostitutes. Their search eventually turned up what they were looking for. A young Hispanic girl, probably about thirteen years old who spoke very little English, took a long stern look at the photograph, and proceeded to take them back to her less-than-cheery-to-speak-to-the-cops parents. 

From there it was easy to trace Angelique’s home address. When they pulled up Ray was somewhat relieved to see his initial assumption was correct. This place was far removed from a paradise, almost Orwellian even. The grass was brown, dead and crispy. A rusty chain link fence bent every which way ran the property line. Some sections had peeled away and hung menacingly over the sidewalk. The walkway leading up to the property was cracked and broken; weeds of vibrant greens growing through the crags were the only semblance of life visible on the property.

The place reeked of poverty.

There was no way the tape player belonged to Angelique.

Mrs. Martíz received the news as well as could be expected. Her son Juan had to come out and translate for Ray as neither man spoke enough Spanish to deliver the message alone. Tears filled the young man’s eyes as he relayed the news to his shocked mother. She collapsed to the ground, a cement block forming around her heart weighing her down, the resonance of her screams crashed down on both men like thunder; rattling them to the core. Ray’s blood was cold, his posture was stiff, and he’d done this a million times.

But like everything else, it never got any easier.

Through teary brown eyes Juan met Red’s compassionate stare.

“Do you know what puto did this to my little Angel?” His accent was thick, the family had clearly not lived in this country very long, their dialect was still too heavy. Red shook his head. Even if they did they would never have told him. Neither man would ever allow the opportunity for a victim’s family to dole out “street justice”. Vigilantism wasn’t something they endorsed.

“We’re doing everything we can…”

Juan cut Ray off.

“You do that…” He threw his hand up, he didn’t want to hear anymore, but unfortunately they had more questions for him.

“Wait before you go Mr. Martíz, we need to ask you some questions…about your sister.” The last part struck Juan like a bullet. His eyes closed, tears welled behind the lids, his posture was shaky, and it was all the poor boy could do to stand. He was heavily tattooed but none of them looked gang related. Just the standard religious stuff he’d seen on most of the heavily inked youngsters in this neighborhood of his descent.

Poor kid.

“Like what?” He snapped. “There’s nothing to ask, she was an angel.”

“Can you think of anyone who may have wanted to hurt her?” Inquired Red.

Juan’s expression was more than puzzled, it was furious. Ray imagined the young, tattooed man cutting Red into ribbons with those eyes; they were sharp as a blade and full of piss and vinegar. “You serious right now?” He took a step forward. He was nose to nose with Red, and that was no small feat as he stood a full eight inches if not more, shorter than the behemoth of a cop. “Nobody would want to hurt Angel. Now get lost gringo.”

Ah there it is. Thought Ray. I know THAT one.

He was grieving. They excused the racism.

Red reached into the coat pocket of his blue jacket and revealed a small business card. He handed it to the young man who reluctantly snatched it out of his fingers. Ray thought for a minute one of Red’s digits would fall off and land at his feet with the speed the card was pulled away. It didn’t of course.

“Look…if you think of anything…anything you think might help us catch her killer at all, give us a call.” With that the two men turned and headed back toward Red’s Cadillac. As they were getting in they heard the man call out one last time.

“You better hope you find that motherfucker first yo! You better hope! Cause you don’t want me to find him!”

And they both believed him.

Every word of it.

“This coffee tastes like crap.”

Red was right. It was awful.

But bad coffee’s cheap right?

“Shuttup Red, it’s free.”

“You just come here on account a’ Aubrey.” He said with a devilish smirk thrusting a thumb in the direction of their red-headed waitress.

He wasn’t lying. She was a knock-out.

She had legs long and smooth; the kind of thighs that could cause traffic to back up twelve cars deep should she choose to wear that short waitressing outfit in public. The six inch heels required by her employer couldn’t be comfortable but they certainly accentuated the features of her anterior that made a man’s heart race a mile a second and his head run empty. And when she smiled…

Wow when she smiled…

But he wasn’t going to let that on to Red.

“Y’know, some of us happen to like the coffee here.” He said taking a sip from his mug trying his best to hide his grimace at the thick sludge-like substance swirling around in front of him. He rubbed his eyes. They were waiting for the coroner’s report. They had no leads, no direction, and the most disturbing tape recording either man had ever leant an ear to. This investigation was not going well.

“Oh please Ray, nobody likes the coffee here.” He looked down at his watch. It had been a few hours since their conversation with Mrs. Martíz and her son. “I’m going to go ring the fridge.” That was what he called the morgue. Always the morbid comedian. “Order me a pie?”

After you associated dead bodies with refrigerators. Yeah…sure Red, I’m starving. But instead he said, “Sounds good. I’ll catch her next time she goes by.”

Red fiddled with his suit pockets for a moment. Ray knew what was coming next.

“You wouldn’t by any chance have a nickel would ya…”

Cue the music.

“You’re a cheap sonofabitch you know that right?” But he was already fishing one from his pocket. He flipped it to his friend who snatched it from the air with the precision of a professional athlete.

“Careful with them compliments.” He departed with a wink.

Ray would never understand why Red always opted to use the payphone outside of the diner here when Rick would let him use the phone in the office. They’d only been poker buddies for over a decade now. The inner workings of his partner’s mind were baffling at times. Ray reflected on that as he drew another sip of his wretched coffee. He must’ve been deep in dark places when Aubrey walked by because she opted not to hide the concern in her voice at the sight of his furrowed brow.

“Everything alright sweetheart?”

God I could listen to her call me that all night. But instead he snapped out of his thoughts and turned a half-hearted smile to her beautiful emerald eyes. “Of course. Just a rough morning. What do you guys have for pies today?” He said quickly switching subjects.

Her concern melted away and was replaced with a routine smile, but something about it felt genuine when she spoke to Ray. “We have the standards today sweetie. Caramel apple with a dollop of cream and fresh Strawberry-Rhubarb. Want me to dish you a slice up?”

A sinister smile crossed his lips as he plotted his grandiose revenge on his pal. Red hated Strawberry-Rhubarb. He knew he should get him the apple. But…

“Two Strawberry-Rhubarb’s, Aubrey.”

…he was buying.

That’ll teach the cheapskate.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“It’s all they had.” Said Ray trying to hide his grin as he picked at the pie in front of him.

“Bull snot. That guy’s got apple.” Said Red pointing childishly across the dining room at an ox of a man in a flannel shirt.

“It was the last piece.” Argued Ray.

“Bull snot. Even still, you coulda worked your charms on little Ms. Firecracker over there and wrestled it away from the lucahdor.” He wasn’t kidding; the man was built like a Mexican Wrestler.

He snorted. “You want the pie, you wrassle Frankenstein’s monster. What’d Tony have to say?”

“Preliminary shows some really weird stuff. He’s waiting for a Tox-Screen to come back but he says she looks like she was pumped full of more chemicals than Ringo Starr. There are also some weird cranial abnormalities; he said it looked like surgical procedures.”

Ray’s eyes narrowed. If she’d had surgery there would be some medical records at the hospital. It was a better lead than anything else they had right now. “So what do ya think? Canvas a few of the hospitals in the area? See if maybe our vic’ took a bump on the head and needed to see a Doc at one time or another?”

Red nodded in agreement. “Sounds like a plan.” Then he looked back down at his pie, his face sodden with his trademark grump expression at minor disappointments. “I hate Rhubarb…” he grumbled, “total bull snot…”

After updating dispatch on their intentions they headed out to begin their search. After exploring through the medical records of four hospitals in the city they had turned up nothing. With one left to go they were both praying for the same mythical needle at the bottom of this writhen haystack.

“St. Josephine’s is the last one.” They said pulling into the parking lot outside the gigantic monastic-looking hospital. The only problem being that this place specialized primarily in pediatrics, not adolescents and adults. But there was one thing this place did have above all the others. It contained several of the top neuroscientists and surgeons in the country, and none of them were above trying “cutting-edge” techniques on drifters and immigrants.

It was a grim notion but it would certainly make sense as to why she turned up in the river with inner-cranial abnormalities. The two had discussed this possibility on the way over and neither really wanted it to be true; but they both agreed on one thing, they needed more evidence than a hunch to walk in swinging.

By now it was six P.M. and both men were starving for dinner but they were driven by their ineffable sense of duty. The first two days of finding a murder victim were the most crucial in uncovering the truth behind their demise. They had already lost the majority of that precious window by finding her body so long after decomposition had set in. They owed it to Angelique Martíz to see if her killer hid behind a PhD.

The place smelled like antiseptics and sadness, at least, that’s how Ray imagined it. Every room was occupied by a child with some strange disease or another. Some rooms were labeled with red and black biohazard decals and the doors were sealed shut tight with zippered plastic tents. The measures seemed extreme but Ray had no idea why those kids were so heavily isolated so he had no rights to judge the methods. It couldn’t stop him from feeling sympathetic though.

It took them awhile to find a nurse but when they did she pointed them toward the Chief of Medicine. He was a comely bloke with a disheveled appearance about him. His shirt was mussed and his tie was loose, he wore a permanent look on his face that said, ‘I’ve been awake for 36 hours, approach at your own risk’ and the wisdom of silver streaking through the sides of his hairline.

“Can I help you?” He asked it like a question but it was delivered more as a statement that really asked ‘Can you get this over with? I have work to do.’

“Maybe,” began Red. “We were wondering if maybe your staff had treated a patient at some point, a young Hispanic girl named Angelique for a severe head wound; perhaps surgery?” They were grasping at straws. This man certainly didn’t look like a mastermind of a human organ trafficking ring or even a Josef Mengele. He just looked like a middle-aged, over-worked, underappreciated physician.

He rolled his eyes at the vagueness of the question, “we’re an inner city Children’s hospital. We run off funding from the State, with a free clinic added in last year for a tax break. Do you have any idea how many young Hispanic women my staff treats in the Emergency Room on a day to day basis? Let alone how many of them are named ‘Angelique’ or some variation of? I’m afraid you’ll have to be more specific or I can’t help you.”

“It would have been a head wound.”

“Shot? Stabbed? Car accident? Beating? Take your pick. You’re cops, you know this shithole. Anything could’ve happened.”

“Well we don’t know the cause…”

He cut Red off, “then I’m afraid I can’t help you. You’re free to head down to Medical Records and sift through the files, but I warn you, it’s a war zone down there.”

It was about the reaction they were expecting.

“That would be fine. Thank you for your time Dr.…”

“Dawkins. I’ll get someone to lead you down there.” And with that he exited the small office. It was such a tiny space for a man with such a prestigious position. Real estate must have been at a premium, the State was, after all, notoriously stingy with its finances. If it didn’t suit to benefit the politicians or satiate the mobsters, chances are it wasn’t getting funded.

Good ol’ Detroit.

God he loved this city.

And he loved his job.

But it never got any easier.

That was all he could think about as the two men dug through the hospitals “filing system”, which consisted of beige folders full of medical records haphazardly boxed up somewhat alphabetically and stored in a makeshift plywood closet in the boiler room. When Dr. Dawkins had said this place was a wreck he certainly wasn’t kidding. Some folders had charts missing altogether, juxtaposed together with other random papers in the bottoms of boxes.

At least it beat pulling corpses of teenagers out of rivers.

After a few hours they had still turned up nothing. Frustrated, Ray headed upstairs to the cafeteria and returned with fresh cups of coffee and two fresh volunteers. A nosy duo of nurses named Mary and Diana decided they would lend a hand. They’re shift had ended and helping search for a murderer was something both women had etched into their bucket lists. Too many late nights with ‘Perry Mason’, Ray had laughed to himself when they offered their assistance to him, but the overwhelming mountain of disorganization called for better tactics.

By midnight Red and the two nurses had curled up on cleverly constructed pillows made of medical files and storage crates. The only one still digging was Ray. It was probably the fourteenth cup of coffee he’d just ingested keeping him awake, but he liked to think it was his determination. It was what had made him such a great cop. Heck, it was what made him such a great detective.

St. Josephine’s was a pioneer in cancer research and neurological disorders. Patients came to this hospital from all over the world. The file had been heavily redacted, but even President Kennedy had come to this hospital during his tenure in the presidency, although he had no idea why, but if this place was good enough for the President of the United States he officially had no more questions about the qualifications of the physicians here.

He was however beginning to question the financial capabilities for the Martíz family to afford the care this facility provided.

The thickness of Juan’s accent, the inability of his mother to speak English, the impoverished and dangerous neighborhood they lived in, and the lack of even any immunization records at even one of the general hospitals in the area started to lead him down the path to one conclusion. Even if Angelique was in these records, which he highly doubted, it wouldn’t be under her name. It would be under the name of an American citizen.

But there was no way Mrs. Martíz was going to readily divulge that information to him and Red, and he didn’t feel like coaxing it out of her, she had been through enough. The world was such a cruel place.

So what to do?

He needed sleep. He needed coffee. A shower and something else.

Perhaps Ms. Firecracker, ain’t that what ya called her Red? A firecracker?

He smiled. It was also nice to have a light to hang onto when the darkness rolled in. He turned around and stole a glance at his friend lying on his back with his blue fedora tipped over his face, shielding his eyelids from the fluorescent stimulants above that refused to let his partner sleep. Maybe he should get a fedora too.

Nah.

He only had one box to go. He might as well dig through it then wake everyone up and leave. It’d been several hours since they’d checked in with dispatch anyway, Chief Tibbet was probably getting nervous. He’d be biting his nails, scratching his bald spot, chewing his cigar into snuff, and overstretching the suspenders keeping his laurels firmly placed on his skinny hips just beneath his disproportionate bacon and beer belly. He could picture the handle bar mustache under his nose twitching back and forth as it did when he scolded his men. When he envisioned it, it was comically long, like some eccentric villain from an old black and white cartoon as he tied his damsel to the train tracks.

The Chief was a good man; he was an even greater detective. When he scolded his men it wasn’t because he held himself in higher regard, it was because he expected more of them. As much as he derided them he also praised, as well as the deed was deemed praiseworthy, typically by newspaper publicity or by sheer act of bravery on the part of the officer. Even though his beer belly protruded over his belt and had a slight bounce to it when he jogged, the man was not afraid to lead from the front lines. He had engaged in a shootout in his tenure as Chief on more than one occasion and had led several raid teams into hostile mob controlled hideouts.

But that damn mustache had to go.

July 18^th, 1978

Detroit, Precinct 7, Downtown

Twitch.

He watched it.

There it goes again. Twitch. Twitch. Twitch. Boy he’s really boiling today.

The cigar in Chief Paul Tibbet’s mouth danced back and forth in tandem with the handlebar mustache clinging to his lip for dear life. He wasn’t happy. They had been trying to reach them for several hours. Red had reminded him they had checked in with dispatch and they knew he was at St. Josephine’s, which the Chief seemed to like even less, but his anger had a fresh direction now.

He called in his new target of righteous indignation, the poor sap who had given the Chief the incorrect information. To repeat what was said would make ladies faint, sailors blush, and even the most hardened criminal lose taste for cursing altogether. In short the reaming ended in the Chief looking hypertensive and a poor rookie with soiled pants, an exaggeration but the look on his face conveyed the lump in his drawers metaphorically enough.

 “Sorry boys. Now, what’d you find out?” It was amazing the man had a voice left, let alone the orotund boom that escaped his throat now.

Red shook his big head. Today he wore a bright Robin Egg blue fedora with an ocean blue suit bearing diagonal thin pinstripes. His tie was a dark black and his shirt was an almost too clean white. The man looked right at home on stage in a jazz club, complete with the feather in his cap, he just pulled it off too well. “Nothin’. Victims family wasn’t very helpful…”

“Uncooperative?” Interjected the Chief with a strong stamp of suspicion.

Once again, Red shook his head. “No, they were cooperative. They just didn’t have much information. We canvased a few hospitals going off what Tony said about the head wounds but didn’t come up with anything.”

The Chief nodded.

“We were going to try another angle today. Maybe go back to the brother, see if she had any after school activities”, Ray used his middle and index fingers to make air quotations around the last word, “that may have led to some unsavory characters.”

“We’re also going to check the school, see if maybe she had any bullies.” It was weak, but better than nothing. “We’re going to head down right now and see if Tony got the toxicology report yet for us. Maybe that’ll give us something else to go off.”

The Chief nodded.

Twitch. He was trying too hard not to laugh, the image of the Chief standing over a damsel on a railroad track from last night still vivid in his memory.

“Hop to it boys. I want this psycho off my streets by supper tonight. Understood?”

It was unanimous and not just wanting to rid the streets of the murderer.

But both men wanted him so badly to have ended that sentence with, ‘capisce’?

Red headed back to his desk to ring the brother of the deceased and begin the difficult line of questioning that was sure to ensue. Hopefully he would get the name of her school before he began the interrogation portion. Growing up, Red’s father had been a hard bitten man. He loved his kids, but it was tough love, naturally some of that rubbed off on Red and he had a tendency to push way too hard on someone when he would be dead set that he had been being gentle.

Ray took the winding staircase down to ‘The Fridge.’ Great…he thought cynically, now he’s got you saying it too. The lower level of the precinct was significantly cooler than upstairs, but you had to keep bodies on ice, otherwise evidence would be compromised, murders would go unsolved.

And the place would stink to high hell.

He found Tony with a pair of headphones in, cranked all the way up to eleven, some obnoxious James Brown song resonating in the hermetically tiled and zipped room. He always pictured the doctor listening to the Cars, or the Doors, or some band with a “The” in the title.

Not James Brown.

“Watch me now!” He belted out.

He had no idea Ray was there. He could have so much fun with this but he just didn’t have the time, and he hadn’t slept very much the night before. Too much coffee and too much curiosity. He walked up behind Tony Clay, the Head Medical Examiner, and tapped him on the shoulder. The freckled, strawberry blonde, thirty-two year old prodigy practically hit the drop ceiling tiles two feet above his head. The headphones came off and he whirled around, gasping and grasping his chest.

“What the hell man!” He barked, his tone demanding an explanation for the invasion of what must have been his private time. It was six-thirty in the morning.

“Tox screen?” He asked stifling a laugh brewing deep down in his belly.

“Oh like you’ve never let loose.”

“Oh, you’re absolutely right.” In a mocking fashion, Ray threw one finger to the air and the other hand toward the ground in the most over-exaggerated “Saturday Night Fever” pose he could muster without collapsing from childish mirth. “Watch me now.” He bobbed his crotch back and forth. Tony rolled his eyes, visibly embarrassed. Ray stopped and grew semi-serious again. “Toxicology Tony? We need to know to move forward.”

He shrugged and turned back to the Formica countertop behind him and scooped a clipboard up. “It’s weird. There’s all sorts of crazy shit in there. Spider, snake, even some scorpion venoms showed up. Each of the chemicals found induces a state of hyper-euphoria by themselves in the victims in respective quantities. In controlled amounts the victim could even be kept alive but their endorphins would be way outta whack.”

“When you say hyper-euphoria, you mean like what? Super happy people?”

Tony bobbed back and forth a bit and his expression and demeanor said, yeah sure, if that’s what you gotta reduce it to you caveman. “Essentially speaking, yes. The chemicals are all known to increase the production of endorphins, but then here’s where it gets interesting…” He flipped a page on the clipboard and moved closer to Ray, thrusting it into his hands. He moved over to one of the compartments where they stored the corpses and opened the iron square door containing Angelique’s slab, her third to last resting place.

He looked at her face. At least Tony had had the decency to shut her eyes. He had never liked that feeling, looking into the cold dead eyes of the deceased. It was one of the other things that always reminded him that it never got easier. Taking his gaze from the victim he looked down at the chart in his hand, then his tone went from semi-serious to solemn as the grave. “Wait a minute…this can’t be right…there has to be some kind of mistake.”

“That’s what I thought, but I checked, again, and again, and again. That’s why it took so damn long. He reached into his smock and pulled out a sucker. He popped off the wrapper and slid the red candy into his mouth. “Heroine, pot, ketamine, LSD, psilocybin, the list literally goes on and on, two pages of it.”

“There’s no way. She’d be dead.”

“That’s what I thought, but then,” there was a disgusting wet sound and a stiff crack as he shifted the bloated body’s head for him to see the shaved spot on the back. “…this.” He pointed to a dark circular bruise surrounding a puncture wound and a raised spot from cranial swelling. There were also some old scars he had marked with a blue marker showing that she had indeed at one point received some kind of surgical treatment on her head.

“What am I looking at?”

Tony shrugged. “Beats me, but it sure ain’t a bee sting. If you want my opinion, it looks like someone drilled some kind of bypass into her skull. But I can’t be sure till I crack her open.” He shifted the lollipop around in his mouth. The Chief sort of reminded him of a Civil War General as well as a cartoon villain, Tony reminded him of the audio/visual tech that the studio always forgets to credit at the end of the film. His job was one of the most important of all, and yet, somehow seemed the most unacknowledged.   

But saying disgusting things like ‘cracking into her skull’ in reference to a dead teenager somehow reminded Ray of why no one ever invited Tony to the pub after hours. He cringed at the thought of him carving the girl up like a Thanksgiving turkey and handed the chart back to the man.

“Thanks Tony…for that…visual,” he headed toward the door, “and the information. Let me know when you have more.”

“Will do, but next time, knock will ya, huh!?” He slipped the headphones back over his elfish ears.

Not a problem Tony.

Because nobody wants to see the albino James Brown in action again.

Or hear him.

He made his way up the staircase engrossed in the thought. He couldn’t help it.

Maybe it was the lack of sleep, maybe it was his reaction to his intrusion, but Ray burst out laughing.

When Ray reached the top floor where Red was sitting behind his desk he saw the man wrapping up his conversation and overheard the final words, “…thank you for your time. We’ll update you when we know more…yes…yes, thank you again. Take care.” He hung up the receiver and leaned back, the mahogany and black leather study chair groaned under the strain of the massive man. He rubbed his bear paws against his weary eyes.

Ray had stopped off in the break area where they typically filled out their reports and ate stale pastries from an outdated vending machine and grabbed some coffee. It was worse than the sludge at the diner but it would do. “How’d it go?”

“Well I know what school she went to… Thanks,” he said reaching out and taking the Styrofoam cup. He eyed its contents warily and decided against it, setting it down on the desk, “but something didn’t sound quite right.”

“Like what?” He gingerly sipped the coffee and his lip curled in disgust. Red had been right to set it aside.

He shook his head, trying to find the right words, “I don’t know to be honest. It was like…like she was real nervous about us heading down to the school.” Red had what most cops referred to as a sixth sense, a cop gut. When it came down to nowhere else to go or the man’s internal instincts, instinct almost always won out.

“Problems with some of the students? Faculty maybe?”

“Nah, the brother said she was a model student.” The brother. You had to disassociate. Another nasty requirement of the job. You never wanted to get too close to victims or the family members. It was a painful trial to overcome, learning the difference between sympathy and empathy, but it was the key to their line of work.

“Teachers all loved her?”

“Each and every one.”

He sipped the coffee.

Red drummed his massive fingers on the desk.

Phones were ringing, desk jockeys were shuffling papers, fans were spinning, open windows blared the cacophony of sound from the summer streets below, but all the two men could hear in their head was one sound.

Classical music and the screams of a young woman.

It was ten in the morning when they pulled up in front of Lincoln-Heritage High School. The clouds had gathered above now, blotting out the sun, giving the two hundred year old brick and stone remnant of ingenious architecture a sinister appearance against the backdrop of darkening skies. Ray’s skin began to prickle up, something felt ominous. He shook it off.

Its static electricity ya big palooka. Knock it off.

They made their way into the building just as students began changing classes. There were only a handful of them, and then almost at once both men seemed to remember.

It’s summer.

School’s out, these must be the ones either trying to get ahead for the next year or the ones required to be here in order to be here next year. “Summer school. The dumb kids.” Said Red grinning.

One of the kids, a small framed boy who stood almost three feet shorter than Red overheard him. He turned to face the man who he most likely deemed a bully. “Excuse me, we’re not dumb. There just so happens to be a Science Fair and some stupid basketball game today. Summer school’s on the weekends.”

Judging by his tone it was clear to see which event he had come to attend.

“Yeah, thanks for clearing that up kid.” Red moved along. It was apparent he had hurt the boy’s feelings, but as was his usual demeanor, remained unaware to the psychological transgression against the young man. He snapped his fingers and turned around, “hey kid!”

At first the boy snapped around, possibly thinking he was going to be issued a late apology, but instead all he heard was, “which way is the principal’s office?”

“How should I know?” The boy almost shot the angry words like a gun as he folded his arms obnoxiously over his chest.

You and your charm, Red, you and your charm…

Ray eyed the slimsy kid up and down. He wore a Star Trek shirt and glasses so thick they could pick up cable, his hazel eyes looked ten times too big for his face behind them, like he was trapped in a fish bowl. “What? Too much of a nerd to cause a ruckus now and then? Never been sent down for a good slappin’?” Ray imagined Red probably got tanned quite a few times back in the day when he went through school. He couldn’t imagine that attitude of his just springing up overnight.

“Why do you wanna know?” The boy was getting fidgety and fed up with the back and forth.

Red pulled out his wallet and flipped it open, revealing his detective shield and I.D. to the kid. His eyes widened in surprise. In all fairness, Ray had slept in the same suit he wore yesterday so he most likely looked, and probably smelled, homeless, and Red was dressed, as usual, like a red-light district pimp. All that was missing was a gold tooth, ten flashy chains, a cane, and a strut like he just received a bad colonoscopy.

“Oh sorry,” he said somewhat shaken, “down the hall, last door on the left, sorry…sorry guys…er- officers…” He hurried off. It wasn’t unusual for people to get nervous around cops in this neck of the woods, guilty or not. The department kind of had a bad reputation for excessive force, not Ray and Red, but some cops had been known to push the bounds of not only legality, but just plain humanity.

They made their way down the hall and found him.

He was a fat man in a green suede suit with a purple bowtie. He looked more like a carnival ride operator than a principal; all that lacked was the colorful floral prints and a top hat. As he spoke his jowls bounced up and down, Ray watched them hypnotically as they danced like waves on the sea. It was the little things that brought him joy these days.
            That and he was completely and utterly bushed.

“Look, I don’t care what some woman in the ghetto told you. I know almost every student in this building and I have never heard of an ‘Angelique Martíz’.” His voice sounded sincere, if not also mildly agitated, but Ray pressed on.

“You said “almost” every student. That leaves it open to our interpretation that there may be a couple, a handful even, that fly far enough under your radar? You can’t tell me that out of a student body of five hundred plus kids you’re on a first name basis with all of them.”

“He’d have one of them idiotic memories wouldn’t he?” Inquired Red.

“Its called ‘eidetic’, Radley.”

“That’s not my name. Don’t call me that.” Red snapped in a low biting growl.

“Then don’t be dumb.” Retorted Ray. He turned his attention back to Principal Anderson. “So? Is that your story? You know all of them?”

He was starting to get nervous.

His brow dampened.

His breathing got heavier.

Good ya fat bastard.

Red cleared his throat loudly. “Well?”

Principal Anderson pulled a cloth from his breast pocket and dabbed it across his forehead. “Okay, maybe not every student. But I assure you, there was never a student here named Angelique Martíz. You can even check the records room if you like.”

“Yay…” Said Red sarcastically. “More light reading.” The last part came out as a cynical but whimsical sing-song tone.

“Look,” the principals eyes glistened. Something felt off. “I don’t know this Angelique and I’m sorry she’s missing, but there is a student that hasn’t been here in two weeks. I’ve tried contacting her parents but no luck.”

The two detectives exchanged puzzled looks.

“What’s her name?”

“Monica Crawford.”

Ray pulled a notepad from his back pocket and jotted her name down.

Another missing student? Oh this is so not good. Chief “Twitchy-Nose” won’t like this. This was starting to sound more and more like a serial case every minute.

“She was such a good student. Everyone loved her. Although I don’t think that was her real name. She was an immigrant, but so damned bright. Her and Bobby Liston worked on a science project for the fair today. I never questioned it.” He stood up and wiped more strain from his brow along with the sweat. The man probably weighed a good four hundred pounds, it was unfathomable to Ray one could be so heavy set.

He grabbed a yearbook off the bookshelf behind him and rifled through the pages. When he found her photo he turned it around to show them. Both men felt their stomachs drop and the sound was almost audible. Red reached into his pocket and pulled out the school photo they had found in her beaten up backpack.

“Hmph.” Chortled Ray. “Think she has a twin?”

They were the same person.

Not serial. At least…not yet.

“Bull snot.” He sure did like that word. “You’ve gotta be kidding me. This whole time we’ve been looking for Angelique and she doesn’t even exist anymore. Ya gotta be snottin’ me…” Sometimes he wished he was just curse. It was far less disgusting than his substitutions.

“What’s wrong?”

“That’s her? Monica? You’re sure?”

“Without a doubt, she was one of my favorite students. Always broke up the brabbles in the hallway. Never griped about anything, even when she had her surgery.”

Red and Ray exchanged a glance. Ray had filled Red in on everything Tony had told him down in the lab. The toxicology report, the head wound, the invasive and disturbing phrasing of that afternoon’s surgical procedures, and finally…

Her previous surgeries.

They’d worked together long enough. Neither man needed words. Just that glance. The Principal continued to droll on…

 “…she was just a beacon of inspiration to everyone she ever met.” His voice turned querulous, “why?” The word was drawn out, overstated and ominous.

“Because that’s our victim. That’s Angelique.”

You’d have thought she had been Anderson’s daughter the way he collapsed to the ground. Red had tried to help the big man stay on his feet but only succeeded in throwing out his back. Had the scene not been filled with the heavy sadness of a deceased young girl, and a bright star in the community at that, the sight of this rotund weather balloon of a man weeping like a babe who dropped his ice cream would have been one to laugh at.

Alas, this was not the case.

When the giant man regained control of his tear ducts and sobs he composed himself a bit and turned to them, wiping tears away with his now yellowish-tan stained handkerchief. “I’m sorry…” His voice quivered. “I just can’t believe something so horrible would happen.” He paused; his eyes seeming to count the fibers in the carpet, his mind stretching for anything to block out the punch it had just been delivered. “How did it happen?”

They told him she had been poisoned. That her passing had been painless and her body had been unceremoniously dumped. It was a lie of course, all but the last part, but there was no sense in working him up further. “God…Ms. Howard is going to be devastated. She had such a beautiful singing voice…”

“Ms. Howard?”

“Oh…sorry…her choir teacher.”

“How well did she know Angelique…er…Monica?” Ray was going to have to get used to that.

“Very well. They talked all the time. Ms. Howard is one of the few members of my staff who speaks fluent Spanish. She could be herself around her. I think that’s what she loves the-“ He stopped himself, “I mean…loved the best about choir. That and she had a wonderful soprano voice.”

Both men nodded. They really had all they needed for now. They decided it was time to leave the man in peace to digest the blow they had just administered. “Sorry for your loss Mr. Anderson. Do you have a number we can reach you at if we have more questions?”

He gave it to them.

They thanked him and walked out.

The choir teacher, Ms. Howard, received the news as well as the girl’s mother did. She fell to her knees, but unlike Principal Anderson she was much smaller in stature, and Ray was able to catch her. Red could barely stand up. They had stopped in the teacher’s lounge and grabbed an ice pack for his back. He was certain he’d pulled a muscle.

After she’d calmed down from the initial shock she asked the same question as the principal, ‘how did it happen?’ and they gave her the same account they gave him. She broke down into a fit of tears again, this time it took longer to calm her down. Ray could feel it, he had a sixth sense too, for when Red was about to open his often too insensitive trap. He quickly interposed before anything derisive or sexist could escape.

“Could you head down to the lounge and grab Ms. Howard…”

“Call me…Adria…” She whimpered through teary breaths.

“…Adria some water, Red. Thanks.”

Red knew what just happened and he grumbled something smarmy under his breath directed at his partner but he still wandered off and complied. Even though the man was six years his senior in experience, outranked him by two pay grades, and stood over him like a skyscraper shadowing a mailbox, deep down a part of him was still grateful for his partners ability to keep him from saying things he would regret.

Even if he was deplorable at showing it.

Finally Adria Howard was calm enough to answer a few questions.

“How well did you know Monica?” He asked.

She stared down at her hands. They sat on the cold wooden floor of the auditorium stage. The sounds of children gathering in the halls, readying their projects, and heading down to the cafeteria were all that alerted them to life outside the world in there. Out there the world breathed, it was vibrant and spinning, in the auditorium time stood still, and Adria was the eye of the silent hurricane.

“Well.” She posited meekly. “She was a good student. Loved science and math. Loved to sing…” she sniffed at that part. “We were close. She had a rough childhood, I had a rough childhood, we could relate ya know.” He didn’t want to press about her childhood but he had to ask about Monica’s.

“When you say rough, do you mean abuse?”

“No! Heaven’s no! She just…” She almost didn’t want to say the next part but Ray could almost finish her sentence.

“It’s okay. We know about her…status.” He said the last part quietly so no one else potentially eavesdropping outside could hear. “You can tell me. We just want to find out who did this to her.” He placed his hand over hers. It was warm and clammy. Her deep ocean-mist colored eyes were now bloodshot from misery. Her long brown hair was now a mess from repeatedly pulling at it in her fit of sorrow.

“…okay…okay, I guess then,” Red returned with the water and stood behind Ray waiting patiently, not wanting to interrupt her. “She grew up in a real rough neighborhood in Brazil. If you think poverty’s bad here, ‘pfft’ you haven’t seen nothing.” It was almost as though she spoke from experience although her skin tone betrayed no notion of a Hispanic origin.

“We just connected. Her parents had to make huge sacrifices to get her here – and I mean huge – hence why you’ve probably met her brother, but not her father.” She was right; they hadn’t met the father, just her mother and Juan. “Well that’s because her father is most likely dead. He made the wrong people on the wrong side of the law mad, stole their money, and tried to run. When it came down to him or his family, he let them escape, giving himself up to save them; to buy them and the Coyote time to get them here.”

He knew that word too. “You thinkin’ what I’m thinkin’?” Ray said to his partner.

Red nodded grimly. “Coyotes are ugly business. Even if they do get you here in the best case scenario they’ve still been known to hound refugees for years to come.” Extortion wasn’t uncommon amongst human smugglers. After all, the U.S. government would reward them handsomely for information leading to the deportation of illegal immigrants. It put the poor and powerless between a rock and a hard place.

Land of the free indeed…

Adria looked horrified by the conclusions they were coming to. Apparently there was more to this story. “Heavens no! It was nothing like that! They’re Uncle was the Coyote, he got them here. No, if someone killed her it was probably that dreadful cartel. Lord knows they’re never satisfied till everyone is bleeding to death.” Tears began to well up in her eyes once more. “Violent, savage, monsters…” Her voice trailed off into depression again.

Red handed her the water and she took it gratefully, sipping it delicately with her soft pink lips. She wore very little makeup, which made her look even more beautiful, even though she had been thrown into a traumatic fit by the shock of Monica’s or Angelique’s or whoever she knew her to be’s death. “One more thing Ms. Howard…”

“…Adria.”

“…Adria. Principal Anderson had mentioned something about Monica having had surgery on her head at one point. Do you know where she might have had that done? And maybe even what it was for?”

Adria nodded solemnly. “Yes. She had a tumor.” She motioned to the back of her head to demonstrate where it had been. “It used to give her awful headaches. St. Josephine’s saved her life. I’m sure the doctors down there can tell you more.” She stood up and cleared her throat. After a few deep breaths and wiping down her face with the sleeve of her daffodil yellow blouse she smoothed her black and silver patchwork skirt down and mustered the best smile she could. “I’m sorry I can’t be of more help gentlemen.” She was genuine. “Please find who did this to her. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go find Bobby.”

As the two men were leaving the school they heard a terrible sound.

“Cracked rice?! Someone skinnin’ a kitten?” Said Red craning his head all around to find the source.

They both turned toward it to see Ms. Howard and Principal Anderson with the young boy who had pointed them toward the principal’s office when they got there. He was sobbing loudly, honking his nose pathetically. Adria ran her hand across his back soothingly, wiping tears from her own eyes as she did so with her free hand. Principal Anderson just stood there, looking like an elephant frozen by fear in place.

“Be nice you frickin’ gorilla.” Said Ray slapping the back of his hand across his partner’s chest. “The kids like thirteen, it can’t be easy.”

“Never is. Never’s fair neither.”

He was right. It was seldom a fair world.

And it never got any easier.

“You can’t search for killers on an empty stomach.”

“No but you can find a place with better ‘dog spam’ coffee.”

His number one cardinal rule. Red never took the Lord’s name in vain. But he had no problem reversing it and putting the word “dog” in front of a wide array of other adjectives and nouns. Sometimes he was quite creative with it, like now, spam was a new one.

“Some of us happen to-“

“Yeah, yeah, cut the bull snot. Sheesh. I don’t even know why I let you boss me around; I’m the one with the wheels.” He said as the two men climbed out of the Cadillac in front of the diner Aubrey worked at. Ray could see her through the window, skirting around gracefully inside, her red hair bouncing up and down as she did so, her hips swinging that big beautiful-

“But you didn’t let me finish,” he uttered slyly, “I was gonna say ‘happen to like the view’” He finished clearly referring to Aubrey. He was so brazen outside the diner, every time, he’d always talk the talk, but when it came right down to the nitty-gritty…

He was as brave as the scatological remnants of a henhouse.

“Ask her out ya big sissy. What’s the worst she can say? No?” He reeled back making spooky noises and mocking sounds. “Ooo have mercy. The world’s gonna end! The skies falling! Animal Farm is real! Welcome to 1984!”

“Okay, okay! I get it, you can stop now.” He looked like crap. They should’ve stopped by Ray’s apartment real quick so he could’ve at least grabbed some deodorant and a change of clothes. “Maybe tomorrow. I’m not exactly presentable today.”

“Look,” said Red feigning seriousness as he held the glass door open for his friend to pass through, “if I got the balls to put that diesel run-off they call coffee down me, you got the balls to ask Aubrey on a date. Get to movin’ on it kid, firecrackers like her don’t burn forever, if ya catch my drift.”

He knew Red was right. A girl like Aubrey was a once in a lifetime catch. If he kept putting it off and putting it off she’d eventually find the suitor that suited her tastes. Most likely it wouldn’t end up being him, but that was a certainty if he never took a chance.

The two men took their seats in their usual booth. It only took Aubrey a few moments to see them walk in. A warm smile spread across her delicate face. She waved cheerily at them, Red and Ray smiled and waved back as they took their seats.

Wow… That smile. He thought. It took all words away, leaving him with an empty head and sweaty palms. His heart raced faster and faster at the thought of lying with her, gently caressing her long, soft legs. Kissing her sweet cherry red lips so passionately he smeared the makeup all across her face. She’d still be gorgeous to him, it didn’t matter what she looked like or wore. His heart would pound at the mention of her name anyway.

When she made her way over to them she sunnily began her normal routine, “afternoon gentlemen! Cheeseburgers and bottomless chili fries are the specials today. We also got a 2 for 1 special running on milkshakes, whatever flavor ‘floats your boat.’” She giggled at her own corny joke. “Can I get you your coffees to start with Ray?” Her warm smile was fixed firmly on his.

He stared at her lips.

His mind drew a blank.

“Yeah…” Said Red raising an eyebrow as he broke the awkward silence. “And the burger combo sounds great sweet pea. We’ll take two orders.”

She looked at Ray a moment longer, seeming to long for him to speak, she then sighed almost unnoticeably to all but him and said, “be right back with those coffees boys. Hope you’re hungry, fries’ll be right up!” She sauntered off, swinging her hips, clearly striving for the attention of Ray.

And he was the only idiot in the joint who didn’t see it.

Red reached across the table when she disappeared into the kitchen and slapped him playfully on the back of the head. “What are you doing man!? It’s the fourth quarter! Get your head in the game!”

Another one of Red’s quirks. Sports metaphors. Those Ray didn’t mind so much, at least he understood them more than his obscure methodological approach to obscenities. “I’m trying, she’s just…” He trailed off as he watched her laughing at some unheard joke in the kitchen. He wished he could make her laugh like that.

“Yeah, she’s a knockout ya putz, now get on with it! Say something when she comes back!”

“Like what?”

“Fleece and pies I have no idea?! Make it snazzy though, here she comes.”

They went on like high school kids, it was hard to believe Ray was almost thirty and Red was ten years older the way they bickered like children. Actually, it was more like brothers. Their rivalry was more of sibling nature than anything else. “I don’t know…I mean, I-“ She was standing next to the table.

“I…uh…I-I…” He was drowning, he was waiting for the imaginary cane to reach out and yank him off the stage; for someone to tell him this was a terrible joke and he was not actually here in this moment making a complete fool of himself. “I…so…how ‘bout the new notebooks they got you guys. They’re pretty groovy huh?”

Smooth dipshit…real smooth.

As she set the coffees down her smile faded and was replaced by confusion. She shook her head, indicating she had no idea what he was talking about, then looked down at the notebook in her apron. “Oh…oh! No, they aren’t new. I just wrapped mine with some Christmas paper I had left over from last year.” She held up the Santa red notebook proudly. The way the light struck it made it look as though it were glistening.

“Wow…creative!” He was being sincere. She probably thought he was being sarcastic. She tucked it back into her apron and readjusted a lock of her red hair behind her right ear self-consciously with her long slender fingers. He noticed her nails matched the color of her hair. Everything about her was just so perfectly put together. She was the complete package.

And he was completely defective at talking to women.

The defective detective. Has a nice ring. He thought bitterly.

Quickly switching topics, “the burgers’ll be done in about fifteen minutes boys. Be back with the fries soon.” She walked off, taking a few awkward and confused glances over her shoulder at the humiliated detective sitting across the pimp-cop in the blue suit. He dropped his head down into the table, hard, causing the coffee to slosh around in the cups and some to dribble over the edge down onto the table.

“Nice.” Said Red. It took every ounce of self-control Red had in his body to keep from splitting his side. “Absolutely brilliant.”

It never got any easier.