Final Cut

by T. S. Worthington

  That was the high pressure world of real estate for you, though he imagined. He was glad that he had never got involved with the shady world of sales. Every time he saw a salesman he wanted to punch them in the face. It was a natural reaction that most people had, he figured.

  Bill told Teri how much he loved the house and she said she wanted to see it sometime, which indicated to Bill that she wanted him to take her as a romantic couple’s thing. Bill was starting to wonder if Teri was already starting to think of them as a long term thing. Bill definitely liked Teri and he could see a future with her, but he was not going to rush things and force them to happen faster than they should, especially after what happened with his last relationship.

  He hoped that Teri could understand that.

  Bill sat the Black light down and took inventory of the lock picking kit he had picked up in the store as well. He was shocked that it was so easy to buy burglary paraphernalia these days with no questions asked. He probably could have bought a ski mask and a pair of gloves without anyone batting an eye.

  Bill had found out casually talking to Joan that she had a showing at noon and then another showing at four for that house on Sycamore, which meant that the house was going to be empty for another three hours. That would give him plenty of time to go in and find the evidence of the blood on the walls with the black light and take photos.

  He had to gather as much evidence as he could to bring this girl’s killers to justice. And he would be clearing his own name in the process.

  Bill arrived in the neighborhood about eight-thirty. He knew that most of the people in the neighborhood worked during the day and that the house was fairly well hidden from their view anyway, thanks to the long driveway that led up to the house. Bill could not help but marvel at the sweet privacy it would have given him if he had decided to buy the house, which he might have done if he did not discover its gruesome history first.

  Bill pulled up as far as he could out of the sight of the driveway, hoping that no one got a good enough look at his truck or the plate to ID him easily. He had to make sure that no one ever knew he was there. Whoever had committed these horrible crimes had to think they had gotten away with it scot free and that if anyone were ever blamed for it then it would be up the river with Bill Russell.

  Bill pulled the lock picking kit out of his pocket and within two minutes the door was unlocked. He entered the quiet house, feeling a bit uneasy about being in a house he did not own by himself. He had never really broken the law in his life except for a few drunken brawls. Bill was pretty much a model citizen otherwise and that was the way he liked to lead his life. It was good to keep things as uncomplicated as possible.

  He made his way through the kitchen carrying the black light and placing the lock picking kit back in his pocket. The house seemed different in the daytime with the slightest bit of light pouring inside. He was glad it was not located where it became very bright in the middle of the day. Bill was a solitary guy who loved his darkness and if he had to stay in a house that was so bright and light all day long then he would have had to reconsider what he was doing thinking about purchasing this place.

  Bill made his way past the kitchen and opened up the basement door. He pulled out the flashlight he had brought along and descended the stairs. He stopped at the bottom for some reason, just looking around. He did not know why he was stalling right now, but if he had to answer he would have said it was because he kept getting the uneasy feeling that someone was going to come rushing at him out of the dark. He desperately wanted to turn the light back on, but he had work to do that required darkness.

  Bill pulled out the black light in his hand and walked over to the wall where the chip still stood in the concrete plain as could be, a vital clue that was waiting to be discovered. He stared at it for a moment in the faint light coming in from the windows at the top of the walls that sat just above the underground part of the underground basement. His eyes were adjusting and it was just now becoming almost enough light.

  Bill held the black light up to the wall and witnessed what he knew he was going to find—blood. There were obvious bloodstains all over the wall. A part of him had always wondered if this sort of forensics investigation technique was actually fake, but he had just proved that it was totally real.

  He stood there for several minutes in shock and awe at the way the blood stains that the killer thought had been carefully and meticulously washed away to leave no evidence, were still there plain as could be under the black light.

  Bill tried to snap himself out of his daze as he stood there wondering exactly how much pain that sweet girl had felt with every one of those brutal strikes to her head and face. How much blood had been cast from her body with every single blow? As he thought about it now he could not help picturing the image of the blood splattering everywhere as he had seen on the video. But somehow watching it on the video did not seem as violent as it really was. But his subconscious brain knew it right away and that was what sent the nausea flowing up and down through him.

  Bill pulled out his camera and began to take as many photos as he could of the blood spatter that covered the wall. To imagine the wall soaked with actual blood again as he took the photos was dizzying. It looked almost beautiful under the black light, which was the way he preferred to see it, if he had to see it at all. The neon glow of the last remnants of Daisy Fox’s life force were stained against the wall in that dark basement, which no longer seemed like a place that Bill ever wanted to be again.

  The door upstairs was being opened. Bill paused what he was doing to listen. It sounded like Joan. What was she doing there? She was not supposed to be there until almost noon. She must have come to set up for the new showing earlier than he had suspected. He had parked his truck almost behind the house on the other side, so he was hoping that she did not see it or notice it. Bill was thanking his lucky stars right now he’d had the foresight to do such a thing. He had never been a Boy Scout, but Bill was starting to think that he should have been right then.

  He listened carefully to see if he could pinpoint where Joan was going upstairs. Most likely she was just putting some stuff out in the kitchen like cookies and pastries. A lot of realtors only did that if there was an open house of something, but Joan seemed like she was the type to do a smaller more scaled down version of that anytime she showed a home.

  Bill was beginning to wonder how she ever sold anything when it was so obvious that she was trying too hard all the time. He felt sorry for her that the real estate crisis was still booming pretty large and he wondered if she and Buzz were hurting for money. They both had good jobs, but they would never be the type to let on if they were hurting. They were far too proud and ashamed for that sort of thing. They would let you catch them on a street corner homeless before they let you say anything about their situation.

  Bill had to get out of there. If she happened to wander down to the basement he was going to have a lot of explaining as to why he was hiding down there with a damn black light. Bill was not prepared for such a question and would not be able to hope to come up with a plausible answer on the spot like that. That had never been his forte; he was not that quick witted.

  He grabbed up the black light and put it back in the duffle bag along with the lock picking kit. His phone with all of the picture evidence was securely in his pants pocket, but he double checked it anyway.

  Bill carefully tip toed up the stairs feeling them giving way slightly under his weight which he had never noticed before and was putting him over the edge of freaking out just a little bit. He took a few deep breaths and carefully moved up the stairs and waited behind the door. He was listening for Joan to come his way or for her to go in the other room. This would give him enough time to slip out unnoticed. If she went upstairs he was going to run out of there. He prayed for the last option.

  He could hear Joan humming some jaunty tune as she went about getting things ready for the showing. Maybe she had made some
upgrades to her appointments since she had told him about her plans for the day and now she was actually having several people over to look at the place.

  Shit. Why did he have to risk this? It would have been much better if he had come in the middle of the night, Bill cursed himself. He knew it was stupid to do this in broad daylight.

  But then again it would have been much more likely that if he had been spotted by someone driving in or out of the driveway of a house known in the neighborhood to be vacant in an old pickup truck then he would have been on the horn calling the police, just like the rest of the neighborhood would. He had probably made the right decision; it was just damn bad luck that Joan had come by when she did.

  Bill swallowed hard and dared to open the door a tiny crack. He could not see Joan at the moment, but he could hear her humming that stupid song that he knew he was going to have stuck in his head for days now. It was a song he had heard a lot when he was in high school; it was some old Verve Pipe song he thought. He really couldn’t remember what it was called, but he did remember that he had first made out with a girl at Alan Stewart’s party and that song had been playing when it happened. He found himself thinking how odd it was that he was thinking of this right now while crouching in a dark basement to a house he had broken into.

  If he had to remember correctly Buzz was also at that party and the stud he was had been making out with one girl who had to go home for an early curfew and then he had made out with and felt up another girl like right after the first girl left. Bill smiled to himself. Ah, the stories that he could tell Joan. But of course Bill would never tell his wife about this; all of that stuff was going to stay locked in the vault for safe keeping, never to see the light of day.

  Joan came walking right past the door right then and Bill caught a whiff of her sweet perfume and a bit of the breeze her body created as it cut through the air. She had been so damn close to him. He had almost turned and tripped down the stairs. Joan definitely would have heard that and that would have led to all of those questions that he was trying to avoid.

  When the hell was this woman going to go away so that he could escape? Dammit!

  But what about the truck?

  The thought popped into his mind killing any hope he had of making a reasonable escape from this. Even if he managed to get past her and out of the house then he was still going to have to fire up the truck and drive it out. She was probably going to hear that and she might even see him driving away. He was so screwed. There had to be a way for him to get out of this.

  He had to get to the truck and drop off his tools. Then he had to pretend that he had just shown up at the house to take a look at the property and saw that Joan was there. Brilliant! Let’s give that award for genius rational thinking of the decade to Mr. Bill Russell. The crowd goes wild.

  It must have been about five minutes after the brilliant idea when Bill heard Joan leave the house, get in her car, and drive away. He took a huge breath of fresh air and sat down on the top step for several minutes.

  Then he left the house and drove the hell out of there. He hoped it was close enough to the first guests arriving that no one would notice his car coming and going right before then.

  It had been one hell of a morning.

  Chapter 10

  “HIDDEN TRUTHS”

  “I’m fine, Frank. Really, I am.”

  Bill had accepted his parent’s invitation to have dinner with them on short notice because he realized he had been neglecting them a bit lately. It would look odd if he suddenly stopped seeing them since he loved them both dearly and had always been extremely close with his mother. He and Frank had their differences over the years, but they had worked them out and had become fantastic friends.

  Bill had originally had plans with Teri, and when he called to cancel she suggested that she come along to meet his folks on a more personal level. She had met them and talked to them a bit at the hospital, but it had been such an emotionally charged atmosphere that she did not feel like they really knew each other.

  Bill was a bit shocked that Teri was already suggesting a formal meeting of the folks, but for some reason he found himself saying yes. He found himself saying a lot of things to go along with Teri recently, and that was not really his style. He had always been a take charge and do your own thing kind of guy, but something about Teri made him want to make her happy. He had never felt that way about a woman before; if a woman did not like him for who he was then she was not worth even bothering with. That was the philosophy he had always lived his life by, but now he was starting to turn over a new leaf. Bill wasn’t sure if it was just for Teri or if it was the way his life was going to be now that he had survived death and come back out of it totally unscathed. He could not help but feel that deep inside he sometimes felt that he was being punished for the things he did wrong in life and that was why this had happened.

  Bill had never been a religious man, despite his mother constantly trying to cram it down his throat and now his stepfather trying to do the same thing since he came into the picture. Bill just never really felt that close to an invisible being that no one had ever seen and just accepted as real. It all seemed weird to him and it had ever since he was a small child.

  Teri and his mother were getting along famously as his mother told her all of the super embarrassing stories that no child ever wants told to anyone, especially their girlfriend. She ate it up with a spoon as his mother told her story after story. After the first two or three he didn’t really mind it so much. The damage had already been done. Besides he loved to see Teri smile and anything that kept the smile on her gorgeous face was pretty much ok with him.

  His stepfather, Frank was worried a bit about him because it had become obvious that Bill was not sleeping that great. He hadn’t really told anyone about this, but if it was that obvious that his stepfather pointed it out then he must have been looking crazy peaked under the eyes. Teri had not said anything to him, but it was quite possible that she was just too caught up in his charisma and charm. It could be devastating. He had to laugh at his skewered viewpoint of himself.

  “I know you think you are ok because you are a young man and you feel like you can go forever. But trust me when I tell you that if you don’t get proper rest then eventually nothing in your body really works correctly,” Frank replied.

  Bill knew that Frank was just trying to help and he was showing some concern. It was actually pretty touching seeing how his real father had never showed any ounce of concern or compassion for neither Bill nor his mother. All he had ever shown them was abuse and pain. Bill had often dreamt that Frank had shown up years before he did to save he and his mother from the hell that they had found themselves trapped in. But Frank had not shown up until Bill was almost a man himself. It was still nice to have now, but he still found himself longing for memories with a father growing up that he would never have. It still hurt when he thought about it.

  “I understand. You’re right. I haven’t been getting the proper rest. It’s been difficult since the accident though. It’s like my mind is tired and my eyes are tired, but my body just isn’t.”

  “That is perfectly normal to go through that for the first couple of months,” Teri said.

  “Is that so?” Frank asked.

  “Yea. Well, when you think about it his entire body was at rest for almost three months. It does not need rest, but his mind and certain vital organs do or they will begin to shut down. Eventually the body and the mind will get synced back up again and he will be fine. I’ve seen it happen a lot.”

  Frank paused for a moment and Bill could almost see the gears working in his mind wondering what type of hooey that was that this girl had just said, but he eventually smiled and said “Oh, ok.”

  Bill appreciated that his parents were making an effort to accept Teri and to give her a chance because it was probably pretty obvious how close he was to her. He wanted to wrap his arm around her and pull her close enough so that h
e could whisper sweet nothings in her ear and possibly give her some sweet kisses, but Bill was not a total animal and he was able to control himself in front of his parents.

  “So, are you just going to stay awake until your body decides that it needs sleep?” Frank asked.

  Bill rolled his eyes, but he knew that Frank did not mean any disrespect towards Teri by his question. He observed Teri to see what her reaction was, waiting for her to shake it off or waiting for her to get offended. Teri paused a few moments and then pulled a fast one by ignoring the fact that anything that could be taken in an offensive manner had even been said.

  “Well, the mind probably won’t let that happen. It will force Bill into little micro sleeps for a while until his body catches up with him.”

  Teri uttered her reply with that same sweet smile that Bill had grown to love and adore. He could see the gleam in his stepfather’s eyes that he saw something special in Teri too. That was starting to become very clear.

  “So, Teri you are Buzz’s younger sister?” Frank asked. “How come we haven’t seen you much around? That boy used to come over here all the time, from what Estelle tells me.”

  “Well, I was away at school of course and when Bill and Buzz were kids they did not want much to do with me. I was a girl and I was much too young to hang out with them. It was tough, but I got through it,” Teri said with a laugh.

  “That’s great,” Frank replied.

  That was Frank’s standard reply when he really had nothing else to say or add to the conversation. Bill couldn’t help but laugh to himself when he heard it. It was always said with that same monotone and the same pitch. It was very cliché and routine. And Bill loved it dearly.

  His mother had fixed her specialty—spaghetti. Bill had actually not had his mother’s amazing spaghetti for what seemed like an eternity and while he was eating it he had the realization that he had not enjoyed it since before he went into the coma. Even after the time he had been out he still felt like he had missed out on so much.