What You See

by Hank Phillippi Ryan

  He watched two obvious cops, leather jackets dead giveaways, sidle through the crowd, moving quickly and deliberately. Where were they going? Seemed headed toward that alley by the bank. Maybe better to follow them? What if they were on the way to a big takedown, and he could get the whole thing on camera? That’d make his career, right there. Oh, yes, I got photos of it all, he’d say to Jane. How much will you pay me for them? Two hundred dollars, maybe. Three.

  He checked his battery, fine, plenty of juice. Now Jane was handing the guy a cell phone, maybe she’d called someone to convince the cadet to let her through. Maybe she didn’t need his help and he should—where did the two plainclothes cops go? He eyed the crowd till he finally saw them, the skinny one and the preppy one, poised on the curb, focused down that alley. Someone, or something, was back there, no question. No one else seemed to care about those two, all the morbid onlookers still fascinated by the dead guy. But he, Bobby Land, had the eye. His mother always said so.

  Cops? Or reporter? Which would be more useful to follow? Which would give him the faster claim to fame?

  * * *

  With the help of a credential-confirming phone call from the Channel 2 assignment desk, Jane finally negotiated her way to the perimeter of the crime scene. She’d left her car at the University Inn, given ten bucks to the hotel’s valet guy to watch over it.

  She paused, taking it all in. A nothing day, early June, lunchtime. That shockingly blue sky Boston sometimes lucked into. There was always the first moment at a murder scene, always having to juggle the stress of getting the story with the realization that someone’s life was over. Her job was to report what she saw, what she heard, what she could discover. An odd career choice, really, to be the eyes and ears of the public. Observer, always, never a participant. And because it was “news,” she had to do it as quickly as she could. A constant series of assessments, decisions, choices. Perceptions. So much of reality wasn’t what it seemed at first glance.

  Cadets had grouped spectators into packs of five or six, obviously taking names and info. That meant each and every one of those people was a potential eyewitness. A potential interview.

  She’d record their sound on the Quik-Shot, the little video camera the station had given her. The size of a cigarette pack, unobtrusive, but wide format and surprising quality. The days of the hulking photogs lugging huge cameras were over—Jane could point and shoot and get it on the air, what they called a one-man band. The photographers’ unions weren’t happy about it. But it sometimes made things easier.

  Jane pulled out the Quik-Shot, crossing mental fingers. Nothing like the first time using unfamiliar equipment. Nothing like trying it out with no practice. At a murder. If the red light was on, was that good, the universal signal for “camera rolling”? Or bad, the universal sign for “warning”? Jane would roll off a few shots, then check for audio and video quality.

  They hadn’t moved the victim yet, good thing. She got as close as she could, pushing through the looky-loos, then pointed the lens, rolling off thirty seconds as close up as appropriate—no blood allowed on Channel 2 News, so medium tight was all that would air. Then a wider shot, showing all the medics, then even wider, showing the crowd. Pan across to reveal the number of people. Tight shots of a few on their cells, a few others clicking off photos.

  She was taking pictures of people taking pictures. Very twenty-first century.

  The medical examiner was already there, meaning someone had died. Kat McMahon might slip her some inside info, if she could get to her. The two women still weren’t sure of each other, still skittish about their conflicting responsibilities—Jane’s to tell and Kat’s not to—but Jake had let it slip that Kat and DeLuca were an item. So there was some solidarity in mutual professionally iffy behavior.

  What had happened here? Jane would need to ask around, see if any of the onlookers saw anything revealing. She’d look for tweets, too, and Facebook posts. She could imagine the texts. OMG, I’m at a murder! The cops were certainly trolling for video, too. And they had dibs. Unless Jane got lucky.

  Wide, medium, tight. Pan of the crowd. Establishing shots. She hit the double backward arrows—that had to mean rewind—hit Stop, then the one forward arrow, and after half a second of snow and a twist of color, saw the whole thing again on the tiny screen. Okay. It worked.

  She stopped for a moment, the sun hot on her hair. An empty brown paper bag caught the breeze, fluttered, and flapped away. Someone had left a big phone book on the bench. Cops were everywhere. Was there anything she’d forgotten?

  Across the street sat the grotesque gray stone façade of the monolithic Boston City Hall, a controversial and unattractive expanse of concrete and double-tall plate glass. She shot the exterior to illustrate the irony that this crime occurred right under the noses of the city officials. She zoomed in to one window in particular. The mayor’s office.

  Mayor Elihu Holbrooke—or someone in his office—could probably have seen what happened right from that window.

  She tucked that thought away for later. This wasn’t going to be her story, she reminded herself. She was a per diem. A freelance. A TV temp. Not that anything in TV wasn’t temporary.

  Now the interviews. She scouted the onlookers. Saw a possibility.

  “I’m—” Jane began.

  “Yes, I’ve watched you on TV, Jane,” the woman said.

  Bingo. Jane aimed the little camera.

  “Could you tell me what you saw?” Jane had chosen the woman—khaki linen suit, possibly-diamond stud earrings, and leather briefcase—because she was reasonably well dressed, looked like she spoke English, didn’t seem in a hurry. Profiling, sure, but the key was to get usable sound bites, articulate, containing actual information. Emotion, if you were lucky. Jane was also careful about diversity. It all mattered, requiring more judgment than simply sticking a mic at some random face. Unless that was your only option.

  “I suppose so,” the woman said.

  To keep the context, Jane composed her shot so the circular park and the wide-open doors of the ambulance were in the background. This time of day, the sunlight was impossible. The only choices were squinty eyes or glary backlighting. Jane opted for sun on the woman’s face.

  The woman blinked at Jane a few times. Took a step away from the camera. Jane stayed put. No need to crowd her.

  “Ma’am?” Jane said.

  “I was getting lunch at the corner, at the counter,” the woman began.

  Cor-nah, coun-tah, Jane heard. So, a local. Good. “Then what?”

  “I heard yelling. There’s always commotion around here, with the traffic and tour buses and all, and my office is up there, on the third floor of the bank.” She gestured behind her. “I’m used to it, so I got my takeout, as usual, assumed it was a…”

  Jane let her talk, tried to keep her camera steady, hoping something usable was coming. The woman’s back was to the murder scene—if it was a murder—so Jane could keep track of any changes while the woman talked and shift the camera if necessary. In the viewfinder, the video appeared black and white, which made it a pain to keep track of individuals. Still, the main attraction would easily recognizable: the one laid out on a stretcher. Jane had to get the money shots, the one of the victim getting loaded into the ambulance and of the ambulance driving away.

  She supported her threatening-to-be-weary camera arm, holding her elbow with her left hand.

  Nothing could stop her now.

  5

  As Tenley felt the touch on her shoulder, she flinched, spooked. She turned to see Ward Dahlstrom, boss man, big shot, GQ wannabe, who had all the other office girls swooning. Not her, of course, not ever. Ticktock, in four hours she’d be home.

  “Miss Siskel? Are we ready for lunch in fifteen minutes?”

  Dahlstrom smelled like peppermint and, she swore, scotch, even though it was barely lunchtime on a Monday. She hated his hands, his manicured fingernails. His preppy checked shirt. His show-offy watch. She and Lanna met him fir
st when they came to visit with Mom, him and his stupid jokes, and even Lanna thought he was cool, “so much power” and “a real man” and “so handsome.” Tenley never understood that. Plus, she completely loathed when he said “we” when he meant “you.”

  “I guess so,” she said.

  She felt Dahlstrom standing there, felt him walk away. He didn’t like her. So what? Maybe at lunch she should head down to the park, see what was going on in real life, not sit here and watch the movie of it.

  Tenley tugged her hair into a knot, looped the long strands twice, then stuck in a yellow pencil to hold it off her face. Blinked at the screen of Curley Park in front of her. Like a … movie? That made it, somehow, kind of different.

  Watching her computer monitor was kind of like watching a movie. A movie of people’s lives. Weird that it was her, a college student and the only remaining Siskel daughter, watching this Curley Park story—whatever it was—unfold.

  The monitor was the only good thing about this job. It let her look for Lanna. Lanna, who she knew was gone, impossibly and unbearably gone. She watched for Lanna in crowds, in the audience at concerts, looked for her ponytail and shoulders at Starbucks. Sometimes thought she’d caught a glimpse of her just around a corner. She’d even—she was embarrassed to admit—run after a few girls, Lanna’s name on her lips, but soon skidded to a halt, remembering her older sister would never return.

  Lanna was dead. No one could bring her back.

  But watching for Lanna was a way of keeping her alive. Thinking just the next moment, in the next screen, her darling sister would appear. She’d recognize her walk, or that way she stood, one foot on her knee like a stork, her ponytail bobbing outside her Newton North High School baseball cap.

  It couldn’t happen, of course. Dead, and buried, funeral and everything. She’d been there. There was no mystery, no suspense. Lanna, almost twenty-two, and cool, and beautiful, had “met” someone online. But one night she’d gone out late, no one knew why, and tripped, hitting her head on a log in Steading Woods, the expanse of pine trees and underbrush behind their house in Forest Hills. She was found the next day, just off the path. No trace yet of the “boyfriend,” police said, after taking Lanna’s computer. Looked like an accident, the police said. She’d had no suitcase, no purse.

  Did Tenley know the boyfriend’s name? Where her older sister might have been going? No, she’d said, and that was true.

  But Tenley knew Lanna had been planning to run off with him. Someday, though. Not that night. She’d promised Lanna never to tell. And hadn’t. Until it didn’t matter anymore. She never forgot the way her mother had looked at her then, and her father, and even the cops. And everyone. Everyone. Could she have saved her?

  Tenley had been eighteen. A kid. She’d loved her sister. Every cool sister has some cool boyfriend, and Tenley only wanted Lanna to love her. Sisters don’t tell, Lanna insisted. There was nothing bad, Lanna promised. How was Tenley supposed to know? Anyway, maybe it really was an accident.

  Tenley had hidden in her room for … she didn’t remember how long. Looking up “missing sister.” Looking up “runaways.” Maybe Lanna had simply gone for a late-night walk, wrong place, wrong time. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

  How could she have—Tenley closed her eyes, imagined the Cape Cod beach where they all used go, imagined the seagulls swooping overhead, the whoosh of the waves. Tried to get calm, like her shrink Dr. Maddux tried to teach her.

  How could Tenley explain she was just—looking for Lanna. Not expecting to see her. Not even, really, hoping. Just looking.

  If Tenley ever had another sister, she’d never let her out of her sight.

  Curley Park was still on her screen. She should click to the next one, but she had to admit things were getting a little interesting down there. She could kind of see, but not too well, there seemed to be someone lying on the ground, and they’d put up that yellow crime scene tape. Tenley was getting better at making things out in surveillance video, maybe her brain was getting used to it, but since this was a traffic room, the cams were focused on the street.

  But there wasn’t any traffic. Looked like the cops had stopped all the cars. Screens five and six were so empty, they were like still lifes. Seven, where the ambulance waited—she could see the doors open now—was getting more and more crowded. Now they were—what was going on? The shape of the crowd was changing. She poised her finger over the green button labeled RECORD TWENTY SECONDS.

  Should she record?

  Should she, um, talk to someone?

  6

  Jake felt DeLuca close behind him as they rounded the first bend in the alley. Flat out running now, the rhythm of their footsteps matching, the gravel spitting underfoot. The one stripe of sunlight between the buildings on each side layered a frustrating glare on whatever waited ahead.

  Jake kept the Glock pointed at the pavement. Nothing they could do to stop the sound of their footsteps echoing off the graffiti-covered brick walls that tunneled them to the north. Whoever was back there, in the gloom, would know someone was coming.

  Three pigeons, startled, flapped up in gray confusion. Maybe a rat scuttled away, or maybe it was only a shadow. Jake’s eyes narrowed, listening as hard as he could with each step that brought them closer. They had no choice but to take the next two curves, see what the dead end had in store.

  They’d arrive in thirty seconds. Less. A killer had stabbed someone in broad daylight in the midst of the lunch hour, in front of God knows how many people. Where had that killer gone? Down here? And if so, was he—or she—now hoping to kill again?

  Was this another victim, calling for help? If so, were they about to see the Curley Park killer?

  Or could this be the bad guy? Maybe holding his next victim?

  “Help me!” The call came again, louder now, a man’s voice, tight with fear. Or injury. Or play-acting.

  Dammit, there was no way to see back there. Who’d told the cadet about this? Where was that woman? What did she know? What had she seen? Was she part of some plan?

  They were headed into a dead end, with a stone killer on the loose. Sounded melodramatic. Until you were in it.

  Jake managed one look over his shoulder as he ran, checking on his partner. “Set?”

  D gave a thumbs-up with the hand that wasn’t holding his weapon. “Set.”

  Jake had radioed they were going in, so backup would arrive if needed. Around the next bend, Jake knew, was a concrete wall and a Dumpster. No question whoever was back there had heard their footsteps, but could have no idea who was headed in their direction. Might declaring their identity spook whoever this was? Start a barrage of gunfire that would certainly end in disaster? Or would it reassure whoever it was, announcing help was on the way? Only one fricking way to be sure.

  “Boston Police!” Jake yelled.

  * * *

  “Jane? It’s Melissa.” Meliss—? Oh, Melissa. At 12:46, when Jane’s cell phone showed “blocked call,” she’d hoped it was Channel 2. But Jane barely got out a “hello” when her sister started talking. The khaki-suit lady’s interview was wrapped, and Jane was on the hunt for another likely candidate. Should be a man, since she already had a woman on camera. If she got two usable interviews, maybe three, that’d do it.

  “Hey, Liss—Melissa,” Jane said. “Are you here? Already? I’m so sorry, I’m right in the midst of someth—”

  “Jane, look, I’m a little concerned,” Melissa went on, as if Jane hadn’t said a thing. So what else was new. Melissa probably wanted to change the color of the wedding flowers, or change the font on the place cards.

  “If it’s about the wedding, Liss, I do want to hear, and I don’t mean to cut you off.” A wedding was a once-in-a-lifetime occasion, and Jane had promised herself not to get in the way of Melissa’s day. Even though Melissa thought all days were Melissa days. “But I’m out on a story, and the police are trying to keep me away, and it’s—”

  “A story? I thought you’d been fired again,” M
elissa said. “Anyway, this’ll only take a second. You know Daniel and I were supposed to…”

  Jane tried to listen and keep watch on the crime scene at the same time.

  “I’m in Boston now,” Melissa was saying, “but Daniel’s flight from Switzerland got delayed. That means I have to stay at Robyn’s house without him, which is way out of my comfort zone. Oh. Wait. Hang on.”

  Robyn, Jane knew, was Gracie’s mother. Daniel’s ex. Jane took a deep breath, asked the universe for patience and understanding.

  And for at least thirty seconds in which nothing new happened.

  Holding the phone between her cheek and shoulder, Jane pointed her little Quik-Shot at the crowd. While she waited, she’d get a few more wide shots of the scene, just in case.

  Jake always complained about the lookies, not only their ghoulish curiosity but also how they contaminated a scene, sometimes even picking up evidence as souvenirs, and that the people who actually had information never wanted to tell it, while those who “didn’t know shit,” as Jake put it, tried to make the police believe they had the goods.

  Wonder where Jake is now? She allowed herself to think while Melissa had her on hold. The EMTs still knelt by the victim. The ambulance doors remained open.

  “Melissa? Are you there?” The onlookers’ interest seemed to have moved from the body in the park to an alleyway across the street. Jane followed their attention with her camera. Something was going on back there, and she needed to find out what. She couldn’t believe her sister was making her wait.

  “Melissa?” She tried again.

  She couldn’t blow this very first—she hoped not “only”—assignment because of a phone call from her sister. She needed fifteen uninterrupted minutes, and there was nothing on the planet that could deter her.

  “So here’s the thing—” Melissa was back.

  “I have to cut you off,” Jane said, “because—”