by David Bell
Bright light spilled through the large bedroom window that faced the street, creating a rectangle pattern across the bed.
I took a step inside and my foot brushed against something. I looked down and saw clothes scattered across the floor. A lot of clothes.
The sheets and the comforter were bundled up and halfway falling off the mattress. The air felt close and stuffy.
The room stood in stark contrast to the neatness and order of the rest of the house. But, then again, if someone was going to have one messy space, it might as well be the bedroom. It would explain the closed door, to prevent any visitors from seeing it.
The dresser sat on my left, so I started that way, gingerly stepping over the strewn clothes. As I approached the dresser, I saw that several of the drawers were open, and more clothes spilled over their edges.
My foot bumped against something solid.
I looked down and took a step back. Something was buried under the clothes.
I would have gone on, not needing to know what object—a shoe, a book—sat beneath the mess. But some of the light reflected off something buried in the clothes, so I took a closer look.
It took a moment, but I saw the light was reflecting off a watch. I saw the second hand had stopped, the other hands frozen at an incorrect time: twelve fifteen. The crystal was cracked. Some part of me couldn’t stand the thought of the watch being on the floor, exposed to the possibility of someone coming along and stepping on it, further crunching the face or destroying the watch altogether.
So I bent down to pick it up and place it on the dresser.
But when I pulled on the watch, I felt resistance. That’s when I realized the watch was attached to someone’s wrist.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
I don’t know if I cried out or jumped back.
I must have.
But I was too shocked to notice.
I stood in place, staring at the watch face and the exposed portion of skin. The hand and the fingers were illuminated in the glow from the streetlight. The nails were painted a dark color. And a silver ring with an intricate scrollwork design circled the middle finger.
She’s asleep, I thought. Asleep on the floor.
But my mind quickly shifted from the irrational to the horrific. She wasn’t asleep.
She is . . .
While my heart thumped and the sweat on my body turned cold as lake water, I stepped forward again, bent down, and felt the wrist. I pressed my fingers all over, searching for a pulse, but as soon as I touched the skin I knew.
She is dead.
The hand and wrist were slightly cool. I moved the clothes that covered the rest of the body, and as I did, a face emerged, the eyes staring vacantly toward the ceiling. I touched her cheek with the back of my hand and felt the same unnatural coolness.
She was dead. Definitely dead.
And some reptilian part of my brain took over, sending a message to the rest of my body that said, Run. Run. Run.
But I resisted. I studied her face because . . .
I pulled out my phone and activated the flashlight. I no longer cared if anyone saw the light from outside the house. There was something about the woman’s face. . . .
The flashlight lit her face and neck. A trickle of blood marked her forehead, and her hair was clotted and tangled with sticky gore as though she’d taken a hard blow. The stream of light reflected off her dead, glassy eyes, the irises a bright blue even though the lids were partially closed.
I knew her.
It took me a minute, but I recognized her.
Jennifer Bates.
Blake had said “Jen,” but I knew her as Jennifer.
We’d met through work, and while I hadn’t spoken to or even seen her for months, I knew it was her. I couldn’t forget because—
My phone vibrated in my pocket.
Blake.
It had to be Blake. It had to be him telling me what was going on, explaining how it was a terrible misunderstanding. Letting me know the whole thing was a joke, that he couldn’t have sent me into a house with a dead woman.
But when I looked at the screen, things only grew stranger and more confusing.
It was a Facebook friend request.
From Jennifer Bates.
The woman dead on the floor in front of me.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Was somebody watching me?
I clicked off the flashlight, my head turning to the bedroom window. All I saw were the starkly shifting limbs of trees silhouetted against the streetlights.
I felt like a hamster in a cage, and outside someone might have been observing me, seeing how I reacted to the bizarre events unfolding before me.
Was it Blake? Had he killed the woman, then sent me in? And was he now seeing how much he could screw with my life?
Immediately I thought about calling the police, but then how would I explain my presence? If I was worried about my involvement in the accident from college coming to light, how would it look if the police found me standing over the dead body of a female acquaintance?
I needed to get the hell out of this house.
But before I did, I walked over to the dresser, where the letters were supposed to be. Had someone else come into the house for the same reason I had? If the dresser was open, the drawers emptied and searched, could it be we were after the same thing?
I peered into the top drawer, where Blake had told me the letters would be. It was nearly empty. Only a hairbrush and a wadded-up pink tank top remained inside. Everything else was spilled on the floor. I checked the other drawers as well, but it was the same thing every time. Empty or almost empty. No letters. No personal effects. No notes or diaries. Almost nothing.
I looked around the room, the debris scattered at my feet and over Jennifer’s body. It was too much of a mess to sort through. And I felt no desire to paw around Jennifer’s clothes, knowing her dead body lay beneath them.
I asked myself if the killer had used the clothes to intentionally cover her body so he wouldn’t have to see her. Or had the scattering of the clothes been an accident?
My thoughts were cut off by a distant sound. At first, I thought I’d imagined it. Maybe Sparkle had started to howl. Or maybe someone had triggered a car alarm.
I froze in place, listening more intently, my head cocked. Another moment passed, and then I heard it again.
A siren.
A distant siren growing closer.
It could have been something besides a response to Jennifer’s death.
Her murder.
Maybe someone had left their oven on. Maybe an elderly person had suffered a heart attack or a fall.
But could I risk it? Someone had sent me that friend request, almost as though they were watching me. If I was being set up, then wouldn’t it make sense for someone to call the police as well so they could catch me inside the house?
I took a step to go, my foot brushing against the side of Jennifer’s body. I pulled my leg back and stopped. A human being lay there at my feet, someone about my age. Hours before I’d come into the house, she’d been as alive as I was. Breathing, thinking, dreaming. And now . . .
She lay on the floor like a piece of discarded furniture, something I stepped over and tried to ignore.
The siren grew ever closer. I started to go again, but then I saw something under the bedside table, something that caught the ambient light. I went over and picked it up. An iPhone, one that presumably belonged to Jennifer. Impulsively I took it with me as I retraced my steps out of the bedroom, hoping it might provide some information that would explain everything that was going on. I dashed down the hallway, across the foyer, and over the random black glove, which I carefully avoided.
I went through to the back of the house, and before I went out, I took a look through a window that offered a view of the yard.
I pressed my head against the cool glass, turning to the right and left as far as I could. I saw nothing. Heard nothing.
Except the increasingly close siren that sounded as though it was less than a mile away.
Since I had no idea if anyone waited outside, but I did know that the siren grew ever closer, it didn’t seem like much of a choice. I needed to go and risk being seen by someone. Sparkle’s owner or someone else looking out their window late at night.
I used the end of my shirt to cover my hand and turned the handle. As I did it, I tried to remember if I’d touched anything else in the house. Maybe one of the dresser drawers. But they’d already been open, so had I avoided any real contact with them?
I couldn’t know. And I couldn’t go back.
I slipped outside into the cool night, a blissful relief from the tight air inside the house.
I pulled the door shut, and then used my shirt to wipe off the outside handle and the keypad. For all I knew, the police were responding to a summons due to my fumbling with the code when I’d first arrived.
It didn’t really matter. I wiped the handle off as best I could, took one more look around, and saw no one. Then I went down through the neighbor’s yard rather than coming out at the front of Jennifer’s house. If the cops were pulling up, I couldn’t be seen. In fact, I went down a few yards until I reached the street I’d walked up before, the one that ran perpendicular to Jennifer’s. The one where I’d seen the dog walker.
As I came to the street, a blue glow bounced off the fronts of all the houses, and the siren grew louder, almost deafening. The police car sped by in a white streak, and I stopped in place until it was past. It turned right onto Jennifer’s street, its tires squealing, and I knew I had to get out of there and back to my own vehicle.
So I did.
I retraced my steps as quickly as possible without looking like I’d just stolen something. Or committed a murder.
I kept my head down and walked back to the car. By the time I opened the door and flopped into the driver’s seat, my forehead was covered with sweat, and I could barely catch my breath. But I didn’t have time to wait or recover.
I started the car and drove out of there, leaving the neighborhood—and Jennifer’s dead body—behind me.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
On my way out of Jennifer’s neighborhood, I passed another cop car zooming past in the direction of her house, a blur of blue light and screeching sound.
“Crap. Crap.”
The word seemed inadequate to the situation I found myself in. Any words would have been inadequate.
I realized I was driving in the direction of my house, where Amanda and Henry waited for me. But I couldn’t go there. I would have to explain why I’d left the basketball game early. And I’d be returning there without having any idea of what was going on with Blake and Jennifer.
On my right I saw a strip mall, so I pulled in and parked the car far from the stores, which were mostly closed, the windows darkened, the lot empty. My hands shook as I took my phone out. Jennifer’s Facebook request was still on my screen.
The image of Jennifer on the floor—her dead-eyed stare, her chilled flesh—flashed in my mind. I tried to push it away, to concentrate on the task at hand, but I knew I’d be seeing those images and feeling those sensations for a long time. For the rest of my life. How could anyone forget something like that?
I called Blake, hoping he’d tell me something that made sense. That it was all a joke or a misunderstanding or a social science experiment gone too far. As the phone rang and rang, it occurred to me that Blake was the only person I could confide in about Jennifer’s death. At least for the moment.
It scared the shit out of me to have to put so much faith in him.
The call went to voice mail. I hung up and dialed again. Again and again.
The phone kept ringing and ringing until Blake’s tinny recorded voice came on, asking the caller to leave a message.
In frustration I said, “Where the hell are you? Call me.”
I hit REDIAL a few times, jabbing the phone with my finger as hard as I could, as though that would make the call go through. What do they say about insanity? Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result? I knew deep down Blake wouldn’t be answering. I knew it as surely as anything, but I kept dialing until I grew so sick of the ringing sound I wanted to throw the phone out the car window and crunch it beneath my tires.
I ran my hand through my hair and opened my Facebook app, intending to see if there was anything on Jennifer’s page that might tell me what was happening. I went there and looked, but since I hadn’t accepted her request, I couldn’t see much. Just a profile picture of her at the beach holding a beer. No posts or other photos I could see. No relationship information.
And there was no way I was accepting that creepy friend request.
I again wondered if someone—Blake?—had been watching me while I was inside the house. Had the friend request been a test to see how I’d respond? Or was it a threat, an indication that someone held some power over me I couldn’t see?
I shifted my weight a little and felt the bulky object in my left shorts pocket. Jennifer’s phone. I’d forgotten I’d grabbed it as I left the house and drove away, and it made no sense to look at her social media pages when I could look directly at the source.
I slid the phone out, silently hoping it wasn’t password protected. But it was.
“Damn it.”
I slapped the steering wheel in frustration. I wanted to throw the phone out the window and forget it.
But then I thought of the code for the back door. Was it possible?
1792.
So I entered it into the phone. And it worked.
“Thank God.”
I was happy to see Jennifer was as lazy as I was and couldn’t be bothered coming up with a new password for every device.
I went right to her text messages and saw Blake’s name at the top of the list. I opened the conversation between him and Jennifer and started reading, moving backward from the most recent messages. And right away I saw that Blake had lied to me.
At the coffee shop, he had told me he hadn’t seen or spoken to the woman—who I didn’t know was Jennifer Bates at the time—in several weeks. But the text exchange showed they’d traded messages just that morning. And Blake wanted to come over and see her before she left for work because he wanted the letters back. And he didn’t want her to show them to anyone. The messages were terse and blunt, but when Blake said he was coming over to see her, Jennifer responded: It’s a free country.
She didn’t exactly tell him not to come, but it didn’t sound like she wanted him there either.
It was safe to assume Blake had gone to her house after the message. And what had happened then . . . ?
Then my phone began vibrating, and I nearly jumped out of my skin.
I fumbled my phone when I tried to pick it up, and it fell into my lap.
As I finally corralled it, I wondered if the message was coming from Jennifer. Or whoever was controlling her account. And whoever was controlling her account and sending requests must be the killer.
Right?
But when I checked the screen, I saw it wasn’t from Jennifer.
It was a text from Amanda.
I know you’re at the game. But if you get this can you give me a call?
She knew I sometimes brought my stuff to the gym floor with me. There’d been a few break-ins in the locker room, especially late at night, and some of the guys I’d played with brought their valuables—wallets, keys, phones—to the court, where they were safer.
My throat was dry as dirt, and I swallowed as I called her.
I told myself to keep my voice steady. Calm.
“Hey,” I said when she picked up. “What’s up?”
“I’m sorry to in
terrupt the game. Can you talk?”
“I can talk.”
Would she notice the lack of noise in the background? No cheers or shouts? No bouncing balls?
“Look, I’ll make this fast, okay? Hell, maybe I shouldn’t have even called.”
“Go ahead. I’m glad you did. It’s nice to hear your voice.”
“Oh, okay. Thanks. Well, I just wanted to tell you something.”
Once again, I was amazed at how calm Amanda could be, how coolly she could step back from her own feelings and speak clearly about them.
“I just wanted to say . . . I wish you hadn’t gone to that game. I know I said it was okay, but after you left, I really wished I’d asked you to stay. Maybe it’s silly, but I started kicking myself.”
“I wish I’d stayed too,” I said.
“Really? No fun?”
“No fun at all.”
“Well, then, why don’t you come home? Why don’t you just grab your stuff and walk out?”
I hesitated. Nothing sounded better. Nothing sounded better in the world. Home. Amanda. Henry. Peace and quiet.
But I couldn’t do it. Not yet.
“I wish I could,” I said. “It’s just that we only have six guys. And I’m about to go back in.”
My heart shriveled in my chest. I pictured it as a dried-up black thing incapable of love. What kind of man lied to his wife? Twice in one night?
“Okay,” she said. “I shouldn’t have called. And I know you haven’t been getting out for fun as much. Neither one of us has. And I have that weekend planned. You should plan something like that. Hell, do something with Blake.”
“I’m just glad you called.”
“I can’t hear anyone,” she said. “Are you playing the world’s quietest basketball game?”
“I walked out. To the hallway by the court. But I have to go back. Look, I’ll get out of here as soon as I can. I promise.”
There was a pause. Then Amanda said, “Look, it’s just . . .”
“It’s just what?”
“There’s so much going on lately, you know?”