by S. B. Cody
“Did you see anything?” Kara asked, frustrated at another dead end.
“Nope,” Johnny said, popping the “p” sound.
As soon as they let him out, Johnny raced towards the exit, not wanting to spend another second in this “pig pen.” He chuckled to himself as he thought of his little turn of phrase. He’d have to remember that. As he descended the outside stairs, Terry sauntered up, having waited around the corner for him.
Johnny took one look at his friend, and muttered, “Motherfucker.” With that he turned around and headed the other way. Terry took off after him. The two boys traversed a whole block before Johnny finally turned around. With a brusque shove, he directed Terry into a small alley.
“What the hell do you want, man? And what the fuck are you doing hanging around outside like that?” Johnny demanded.
“I wanted to see how it went. What’d you tell them?” Terry asked.
“Hell of a lot less than you did, that’s for sure.”
“They had me on fucking camera. And my mom was right there. I didn’t have a choice.”
“Whatever, man.”
“So, I think we need to put a stop on things.”
“Why?”
“We just got questioned by the cops. Not really a good time to be starting shit. Especially with my mom breathing down my neck.”
“To hell with that. And them. And your mom.”
Terry bristled a bit at that last dig.
“Get me those cop’s addresses like you said you would. With every one chasing their tails, now is perfect.” Johnny didn’t wait for a response. He was done talking to the snitch in front of him.
18
Howard Park stood in the center of downtown and had been named after Clifford Howard, Stanford’s longest serving mayor. It stretched to a little over three acres and served as a popular attraction to Stanford families. Teenagers would often occupy the baseball field while the younger kids would run around on the playground.
On the Saturday following the shooting, what drew a crowd was the memorial service being held for the victims. A group of seniors contacted Principal Devin for help in organizing it. A Facebook invite went out and the town rallied together. So now a group of around 200 gathered at noon and stood in silence waiting for Principal Devin to begin speaking. He stood at the front of the crowd, a board featuring the pictures of all the victims had been erected behind him. Towards the back, Connor stood, keeping his head down. Over the past couple days, additional care packages had ended up on his doorstep and other reporters had called. He hoped to avoid attention and then be out before anyone noticed.
“Thank you all for coming out today,” Principal Devin said, speaking into the microphone that had been set up. “At times of such tragedy, it is very easy to fall into despair. But it is by coming together like we have today, that we get through these hard times. Right now we all have many questions. Who did this? Why? Could we have done something to prevent it? I wish I had answers to these questions, but I don’t. However, there is something that I do know. I know where we go from here. We go forward, and we do it together. But in going forward, we must always remember those who have been left behind. And that is what we do today. We remember. So now in honor of those we have lost, let us share a moment of silence.”
For the next minute, all that could be heard amongst the crowd were the few stifled cries of those who mourned. Connor looked on at it all and tried not to think of a similar memorial he had attended a few years ago for a student.
Once the minute came to an end, Devin spoke up again. “Now I would like to invite people in attendance to come up and share a few words in remembrance of those who have been lost.” At first, no one moved, as though each person dared everyone else to be the first to speak. Eventually, a young girl did walk up front and spoke at length about her boyfriend who had been killed. After that, student after student came forward and shared. Some shared their experience from the shooting. Others spoke about their friends who had died. Others just spoke at length about the tragedy of it all. Over the course of an hour, thirty-two different people addressed the crowd.
After everyone had spoken their piece, Devin took up the microphone. “Thank you everyone. Those were all wonderful sentiments. Now as you can see behind me, we have a poster in remembrance of the victims,” he said, gesturing behind him. “Before you leave, please come up and write a message. It will be displayed in the main hall at school so that generations to come can honor and remember those we have lost. The Stanford West community is a strong one, and we will not be brought down. Thank you, everyone, for coming.” With that the crowd began to break up. Some departed immediately. Others took to the poster and waited their turn to write their message.
Connor turned to head back to his car when he saw Richard idling by himself. He stood beneath a tree simply staring straight ahead, a look of frustration on his face. “Richard. You okay?” Connor asked, walking up to him.
“Hey, Mr. Sullivan,” Richard replied, not even looking at him. “Whole thing is bullshit.”
“How’s that?”
“We don’t honor anyone by doing this. Just do this to make ourselves feel better.”
“Well, we need to make ourselves feel better at times like this.”
“Not working for me. I came here hoping it would help, but it doesn’t. Natalie is still gone. I could sign a thousand posters and it won’t change a thing.”
“People grieve in different ways. You just need to find what works for you.”
“I don’t know that anything will.”
“Pour yourself into something. Must have some college applications you can fill out.”
“What’s the fucking point? I just… I don’t know.”
Connor sighed, feeling helpless. “Listen, Richard, I really shouldn’t do this, but if you need someone to talk to… give me a call.” Connor recited his number and Richard typed it into his phone.
“Thanks. I’ll see ya around.” With that he took off.
Connor turned and walked to his car. He opened the door and began climbing in when from behind him he heard someone call his name.
“Mr. Sullivan! Wait!” a young girl cried out.
Connor turned and saw Theresa Marrow, a girl from his second hour, running towards him. Right on her tail, an older woman waved. “Hi, Theresa,” Connor said, having a bad feeling of what this would entail.
“Hey. This is my mom,” Theresa said, motioning to the older woman who had caught up with her.
“Mr. Sullivan,” Theresa’s mother said in a soft, admiring voice. Connor expected her to continue, but instead, she just stepped forward and wrapped Connor in a hug. “My daughter is alive because of you. You’re our hero.”
Connor gave her an awkward pat on the back before pulling away from the hug. “Ms. Marrow, thank you. But I really didn’t do anything. I’m just glad that she’s okay.”
“Well, if there is ever anything we can do for you, please let us know,” Ms. Marrow continued, wiping a tear from her eye. Right beside her, Theresa looked over with an ear-to-ear grin on her face.
“Thank you,” Connor said, forcing a smile. The three of them stood there for a moment saying nothing before they all seemed to give silent consent to moving on. Connor slipped into his car and drove off.
19
“Okay, so where do you stand so far?” Captain Barron asked. The force had gathered in the bullpen of the station for an update. It was Monday now, about a week after the shooting. Barron’s eyes became fixed on Kara, expecting to hear good news from her. She had spent the entire weekend reviewing the evidence. All of Saturday itself spent reviewing every inch of security footage. She hoped to see anything that might hint at someone. But there wasn’t anything there. Nothing concrete at least. Except one thing did stand out. It came from the footage of Jason being pushed to the ground outside of Connor’s room. As he got up, Michael walked towards him. Jason almost seemed to flinch at his presence. Michael’s simple point over
his shoulder appeared full of wrath. Could he have been the one calling the shots? From there she went to the moment right outside of Kristin’s room. In it Jason busted from the bathroom and it looked like he might jump from out of his skin. The shot he fired went wild. Had those two students not been right in front of him, he probably wouldn’t have hit a thing. And then he just took off running, leaving an easy victim sitting there. Whoever laid beneath the mask didn’t seem fully committed to what they were doing. If they could find Jason, it might not take much to get him to flip on Michael. She felt happy to find this but knew she would need more for Barron. Every time he walked by her, she could feel his judgment.
She also looked around at everything preceding the shooting and right at the very end. She stared at the images of students heading in and out of bathrooms and classrooms. Every time she looked it over, something felt off. She couldn’t put her finger on what, but knew something was wrong.
From there, she looked at the end where Michael and Jason charged into the final classroom, not to be seen again. Kara remembered seeing this classroom when she and Brody surveyed the building. Just standing in that room and looking at the carnage made her feel light-headed. Why did this entire classroom get wiped out?
Kara shuffled through her weekend activities, but knew that she couldn’t offer up feelings as a measure of progress. “We finished up interviews Friday. Have plenty to go through from them still,” Kara said matter-of-factly to Barron, attempting to display more confidence than she actually had.
“Anyone stand out?”
“Nothing concrete, but there are a few who theoretically could have carried it out.”
“Their names?”
Brody glanced down at the pad in front of him and read off the names. “Dennis Clements, Johnny Lemming, Terrance Lipton, William Holland, and Larry Stuart.” At the back of the room, Julie bristled at the sound of her son’s name. She could feel a few eyes fall upon her, but thankfully no one said anything. And the name didn’t seem to register with Barron.
“So what about this Farrah guy?” Barron asked.
“His alibi checks out, and I find it hard to believe that a guy like that could have carried out the kind of organized shooting we’re looking at. Guy can’t even piss without getting half on the floor,” Brody reported.
“So do we believe that his guns were stolen?”
“It’s certainly possible. An infant could probably get into that house unsuspected.”
“So who would have known that he was stockpiling?”
“Sweep of the neighborhood suggests it could be just about anyone,” Kara answered. “Sounds like most everyone suspected that he had something illegal going on.”
“What about the SSPA?”
“Still waiting on a warrant to search the place.”
“I’ll see what I can do about getting that moved along.”
Kara stared over at Brody in surprise, thinking, Is he actually being supportive?
“What about forensics? Anything?” Barron continued.
“Everything on the clothes came on Friday. Nothing useable,” Kara answered.
“Nothing?!”
“The bleach made sure of that.”
“Who the fuck are these people?” he wondered aloud. Everyone looked around, wishing that someone had the answer.
“Anything else?” Barron asked.
“Not at the moment,” Brody said. Kara felt relieved that he said that, not wanting to see the righteous indignation of Barron’s face if it had come from her. She looked to offer Brody a thankful glance, but he barely even noticed her. He hadn’t even looked her in the eyes this morning. When they had come in, he shielded his gaze and only extended cursory greetings. Very different from his usual nature. Kara felt taken aback by the haggard man that sat in front of her now. Dark bags sat underneath his eyes and his lips were chapped.
What Kara didn’t know was that while she spent her weekend engrossed in security footage, Brody had spent his deep in a bottle. He had begun it looking over his case files. He reviewed the photos from the school but every time he saw Mandy lying there instead. He didn’t understand what was happening to him. He had seen plenty of dead bodies in his time on the force, and it had never had this kind of effect on him. But he had just never had to see something quite like this before. Most of the cases he investigated were robberies or domestic disputes gone horribly wrong. But seeing all these kids torn in half by bullets… it just didn’t happen here.
Originally, he had only meant to have a couple drinks to take the edge off. Those couple soon became several, however. Those several became enough that he lost count. Brody laid on his couch, plowing through his bottle of bourbon. The world swam before him and then the next thing he knew, he held his phone and heard Christine on the other end.
“Hello?” she said from wherever the hell she lived now.
“Christine?” Brody said, surprised to actually hear her voice.
“Brody, is that you?”
“Umm…” That was all he could manage.
“Brody, what’s wrong. Have you been drinking? You can’t call me when you’re like this.” The line went dead. The next morning, Brody didn’t even remember calling until he looked at his phone. He debated whether he should call her back and explain himself. Try a little mea culpa. But best to let sleeping dogs lie. He laid where he was and thoughts on her and the train wreck of their marriage. The way she refused to even acknowledge him in court when their divorce had been finalized. That is until the end when she walked up and in a voice like she was reading from a textbook, said that she never wanted to see or hear from him again. He kept meaning to delete her number from his phone, but he knew the second that he did, she really would be gone. Those seven digits were all he had left of her. And she was all he had left of his daughter.
He had considered calling out today, but knew that wasn’t an option in the midst of all this. Still, he felt like an ass coming in like this for all to see, most of all Kara. He had never told her about Mandy. Hell, she didn’t know that he had ever been married. He could only imagine what she thought of him at the moment, so all he offered her was a small frown, and then he looked away.
“So where are you going from here?” Barron asked, snapping Brody and Kara’s attention away from each other.
“We’re going to look into the few kids who could have done it. And once we can, we’re looking further into the SSPA,” Kara said.
“What’s the actual likelihood that they really orchestrated this?”
“Won’t know until we look. Maybe one of the members has some connections to the school. We’ll see.”
“Okay. Get to work.” Kara looked down at her desk, but Barron soon interrupted her with a brisk, “Smalls, come back into my office.” Kara and Brody both stood up but Barron then clarified with, “Not you, Morgan. You stay here and get down to it.” Kara tried to express her worry to him but he simply sat back down and dug into a drawer, pulling out some Tylenol.
Kara stood and made the walk back to Barron’s office. In reality, everyone busied themselves with their own work, but in Kara’s mind they all watched and judged her. Once in the office, she took a seat and stared straight ahead.
“So,” Barron belted out as he fell back into his chair, “we heard from Mr. Llewellyn and his attorney. They’ve made an offer.”
Ugh. I really don’t have the time to deal with this bullshit. “Yes? What is it?” Kara asked.
“They’ll settle for 500K and your badge.”
“Jesus Christ. You can’t be serious.”
“That’s what they want.”
“He’s just being a vindictive little shit.”
“Let’s tone it down a bit, okay? While that may be true, it doesn’t mean this isn’t something that we have to deal with.”
“Well, let them bring this to a judge. He’ll laugh them out of the courtroom and then he’ll be left with nothing.”
“Well, I’ve discussed this with our attorne
ys and they don’t feel like that’s wise at this point in time.”
“What, so I have to hand in my badge because some spoiled rich boy says so?”
Barron gave a sharp tsk and continued, “I didn’t say that. But we can’t afford to let this go to court at the moment.”
“Why not?” But the moment she asked, she thought, Of course they can’t.
“Do you mean besides the twenty-eight dead people and the entire country watching us to make sure we don’t fuck it up? Plus, it’s only a matter of time before Noah Spaulding’s parents bring a suit. We don’t need any more fucking publicity.”
“I understand,” Kara said, finally looking away.
“Yeah. And so does he. He knows we’re desperate to end this, so he’s going to try to exploit it.”
“Well then he’s a sociopath.”
“Granted. Anyway, we’re going to make a counter-offer. Haven’t decided the details, but it will probably entail offering more money in exchange for you keeping your badge.”
“Fair enough.”
“In the meantime, get this damn thing solved. And soon.”
“Yes, sir,” Kara said, swallowing her disgust.
“All right. You can go now.” Kara stood, exited the office, and walked back to her desk. Brody still sat at his desk, poring over the case file, a bottle of water beside him.
“So what’s going on?” Brody asked.
“I don’t want to talk about it,” Kara told him.
“Whatever. So where do we go from here?”
“Let’s see what we can find out about these five kids.”
“It would be helpful if we could see the file the school has on them.”
“Yeah, well we can’t do that without a warrant now, can we?” Kara barked at him, still seething over her conversation with Barron.