A Measure of Darkness

by Jonathan Kellerman

  His hand bobbed near the butt of his gun.

  This: this is how bad happens.

  “Hey there”—I leaned in to read his tag—“Grelling. How’s it going, buddy?”

  “Yeah. Okay.”

  “Cold,” I said.

  He nodded.

  “Listen, Grelling, you mind giving me a hand here?”

  He said nothing, scanning past me, the mass of unknown faces.

  Above us, a news helicopter carved arcs, ripping up the air.

  “Grelling,” I said.

  He blinked. “Yeah.” Dropped his gun hand. “Yeah, okay.”

  A pop-up is a three-paneled privacy barrier, forty-eight linear feet of aluminum tubing and two hundred sixteen square feet of white nylon, weighing about ten pounds; it folds up into a carrying bag for easy transport. Erecting one requires a single competent person and two minutes. With Grelling’s assistance, I got it done in five.

  Small price to pay. Nobody extra got shot.

  I asked him who’d been over the scene. He shook his head as if it were a calculus problem.

  I said, “The vehicle guys? They got their look?”

  Hesitation. “I think so.”

  “Do me a solid, Grelling, go ask at the staging area. Check in with your sergeant while you’re there. You don’t have to come back with the answer, just hit me over comms. I’m Coroner’s. Edison 3618. Otherwise I’m good here. You good?”

  He nodded.

  “I think they brought fresh coffee,” I said. “Thanks for your help.”

  Officer Grelling departed on his new, fake mission. I’d already gotten the green light from the forensics team leader.

  I stepped inside the pop-up, closed the panel behind, and knelt by the body.

  Blood patched the sheet, less than one would expect given the violence of the trauma. In a perfect world, the first responders would not have covered the decedent; in a perfect world, there are no rubberneckers, and we arrive to find everything and everyone positioned precisely as they were at the instant of death.

  Tonight was the world at its least perfect.

  I folded the sheet back.

  She was young. Twenty or a couple years past. Lying on her stomach, head wrenched to the left. The exposed half of her face was heavily made up, white pigments and silver glitter; the skin was unharmed and remarkably clean save a few flecks of road dirt and axle grease.

  The side of her face ground into the asphalt—I was glad I couldn’t see it.

  She wore robes, flowing and white, now shredded. Strapped to her back was a mangled pair of angel’s wings, white faux fur and feathers hot-glued to a hinged mechanical frame, a pull-chain dangling at the right hip. I guessed that the entire apparatus had gotten snarled in the vehicle’s undercarriage, dragging her along.

  Her feet were bare.

  I took pictures, wondering where the second flip-flop was.

  Without another set of hands to assist in turning her over, I decided to skip the full body exam. We’d have more time, space, and light at the morgue. I did do a cursory check to ensure I wasn’t missing anything obvious and to look for identification. Despite the chill, she was well on her way toward full rigor; she had practically no fat on her to retard the process.

  The robe had no pockets.

  Under the robes, she had on white leggings.

  Under the leggings, she had on compression shorts.

  Under the shorts, she had a penis.

  I couldn’t find any ID.

  No cash, either, or cards, or a phone, or keys.

  In a bag, maybe. Left behind in the panic, or thrown clear of the body.

  The pop-up shifted and Officer Grelling appeared. “Um.”

  I let the waistband snap back into place. “What’s up.”

  “There’s a woman out there screaming her head off she needs to talk to you.”

  “What about?”

  “She says she knows the vic.”

  * * *

  —

  HE LED ME to the tape along the south side of 11th. A chunky, blond, spike-haired woman in a denim miniskirt stood rubbing the goose-pimpled flesh of her upper arms. Her mascara had run amok, watery black veins, like a map consisting wholly of dead ends.

  She told me her name was Didi Flynn. She and Jasmine had come to the party together, sharing a Lyft.

  I recognized her voice as the one that had been vying for my attention earlier.

  Officer, please.

  “Can you tell me Jasmine’s last name?”

  “Gomez.”

  “Thank you. I couldn’t find any ID on her, a wallet or a phone. Was she carrying a bag?”

  Didi blinked. “I have it.”

  From her own handbag she produced a plastic zip-top bag containing a battered flip phone, loose cash, cards held together with an alligator clip, and three keys on a key chain in the shape of a panda. “She asked me to carry it for her.”

  “Thanks. This is really helpful. I’m going to take it with me. We’ll keep it safe.”

  Didi said, “What about Jasmine?”

  “I’m with the Coroner’s Bureau,” I said. “I’m responsible for her body and her property, and for determining what took place. Eventually I’m going to transport her to our facility. Right now I’m examining the scene. So any information you can give me to help me understand what happened, I’d appreciate it.”

  She said, “I don’t…There was a fight.”

  “Whatever you can remember is fine.”

  She rubbed at her raw nose. She was trembling. “Someone said they were fighting outside, we went to look. Everyone was—it was like a massive crowd of people, they were yelling and throwing shit. Jasmine wanted to get closer, so we could see, and so we’re trying to get through. All of a sudden it goes pop pop pop pop pop. I didn’t even realize what it was. It didn’t sound like—I mean, I don’t know anything about guns. But everyone started screaming, and running. I started running, too. I thought…”

  She hiccuped miserably and began to cough on saliva.

  I offered her a tissue. She shook her head. “I thought she was with me. I know she was. I saw her, she was right there, next to me. I tried to hold on to her but everyone was pushing, I couldn’t—I had to let go. Then I heard this, this…” She shut her eyes and pressed on the lids, hard. “I don’t know how to describe it. Like an egg cracking. But louder, like a hundred times louder. I swear I could throw up. I turned around and she wasn’t there, she was just. Gone.”

  Didi Flynn opened her eyes and looked at me.

  I said, “Do you remember where you were?”

  “There.” Corner of the sidewalk, where the blood trail began. “And there’s this car, a blue car, and people are screaming, and banging on the hood, like, stop, stop, now.”

  A queer smile, not directed at me, not at anyone.

  “The driver didn’t know she was under there,” Didi said.

  She began to cry.

  My radio blipped; Nikki Kennedy spoke. Any available coroner, assistance requested.

  I said to Didi, “Thank you. I know it’s difficult to talk about. I’d like to ask you a couple of questions about Jasmine.” I paused. “Is that okay?”

  She gestured go ahead.

  “Was Jasmine married?”

  “No.”

  “Do you happen to have contact information for her family?”

  I saw a change come over her, a hardening of the jaw. “No.”

  “It’s important for me to find them, so that I can inform them of her passing.”

  She said, “We’re her family.”

  Any available coroner, please.

  “I understand,” I said. “She’s not married, though.”

  “I told you she wasn’t.”

  “In t
hat case, I’m going to need to speak to her parents.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “If Jasmine didn’t have a spouse, they’re next of kin.”

  “She never talked to them. They hated her. They made her life hell. Why do you think she left in the first place?”

  “I get where you’re coming from,” I said.

  She rolled her eyes. “Right.”

  “I’m asking you, please, to consider another point of view. Whatever occurred between her and them in the past—and I’m not excusing it—she’s their child. They have a right to know. How they respond, that’s on them.”

  Didi Flynn continued to shake her head in disgust.

  “Think about if it were your child,” I said.

  She said, “I’d never treat my child like that.”

  Hello? Nikki said. Anyone?

  I depressed my call button. “Coming.” To Didi: “Listen, you mind if we pause for a minute.”

  She shrugged.

  I gave her my card. “Please stay here. For Jasmine. I’ll be back soon, okay?”

  “Yeah, all right.”

  Midway across the intersection I realized that I’d forgotten to take her contact information. It was that sort of night.

  I hurried back to the tape, but she had vanished.

  4:23 a.m.

  The two Oakland detectives were named Von Ruden and Bischoff. Von Ruden was a moose of a guy, half-eaten rolls of Tums spilling from his pockets as he interviewed a partygoer. It was Bischoff I wanted: he was the lead on Jasmine. I finished helping Nikki load the first GSW onto a gurney, then went to find him.

  Nowhere in sight. I asked the patrol sergeant, who warned me that Detective Bischoff might be busy for the foreseeable future, dealing with the latest vic, at 1124 Almond.

  “It’s a kid,” the patrol sergeant said.

  I swatted air. “Fuck.”

  “Yuh.”

  “What the fuck. In the house?”

  “Must’ve caught a stray. There’s a hole in the basement window.” He made a circle with thumb and forefinger.

  “I don’t understand,” I said. “Why are we just finding out about this now?”

  The patrol sergeant shook his head. His name was Eddie Acosta. Trim, short, brush-cut hair and a prizefighter’s nose. “They’re living down there in two tiny rooms, him and the mother. He’s on a cot by the fridge. She heard the shots but didn’t look in on him. She didn’t want to wake him up.”

  Put that way, it didn’t sound so crazy. You lived here, you heard shots.

  “Some point she notices”—Acosta waggled toward the scrum of cops and cars. “She gets nervous, goes to check. Six years old.”

  “For God’s sake.”

  “Yuh.”

  On the sidewalk fronting 1124, the main-floor tenant was giving a statement to a uniform. The mother wasn’t there. They had removed her from the scene in a squad car, to a relative’s, where she could claw at the inside of her mind in private.

  If she’d checked on him sooner.

  If she’d put him to bed in a different spot.

  If she’d found another place to live.

  I said, “How many goddamn rounds were fired?”

  Acosta said, “Fuck if I know. Twelve? Fifteen? Real miracle is we don’t have more bodies. These assholes are shooting into a crowd of people from five feet away.”

  “Unbelievable,” I said.

  Acosta made a face. To him, it was utterly believable. “Welcome to the Wild West.”

  “What about the vics they took to Highland?”

  “One guy got grazed in the leg. He’s fine. The other’s gut-shot.”

  My hand went to my own torso instinctively, and I noticed then that I wasn’t wearing my vest. I’d gotten dressed in a hurry. I hoped Amy didn’t spot it hanging in the closet. She’d be pissed.

  “I haven’t heard anything,” Acosta said, “so I assume he’s still alive. Although, who the fuck knows? The night is young.”

  I asked about the driver of the car that had struck Jasmine Gomez.

  He paged through his notepad. “Name of Meredith Klaar. She’s downtown.”

  “Witness I spoke to said she stopped the car once she realized what was going on.”

  “My impression, too. She looked a mess to me.”

  “A mess as in upset or as in toxed?”

  “I didn’t talk to her myself. I believe she was Breathalyzer-negative but maybe that’s wrong.” Acosta glanced at the party house. “I’m gonna speculate that there was some recreational use of controlled substances happening.”

  Sarge.

  Up the block, a uniform was waving at us.

  Acosta sighed. Spoke into his shoulder. “On my way.”

  * * *

  —

  JASMINE GOMEZ’S CALIFORNIA driver’s license had her at five foot six, a hundred and twelve pounds; brown hair and brown eyes. Born April 19, 1995. Berkeley address. The sex was listed as F, which meant that, regardless of external genitalia, she was legally a she. That’s what would go on her death certificate.

  They hated her.

  They made her life hell.

  We’re her family.

  Moffett came over to look. “That’s her?”

  I handed him the license, blurry through two layers of clear plastic—zip bag inside evidence bag. “I’m waiting on the detective before I remove. He’s occupied with the decedent inside eleven-twenty-four.”

  He nodded. “Me and Nikki will take the GSWs and head back. I spoke to Shoops. She’s about sixty minutes out. She’s gonna swing by the office and pick up another van.”

  Simpler, in retrospect, would have been for us to use the refrigerated truck; now we had to play musical vehicles. When the first call came in, there was no way to know how many bodies we’d end up with.

  Moffett said, “You can hold shit down here?”

  I almost made a wisecrack; almost gave an ironic salute. Yessir Sarge sir. I still had a hard time thinking of him as my superior. Looking at him now it struck me how much he had aged in the last year and a half. No more butt slapping or wet willies in the locker room. Now he was somber and impatient, the skin of his jowls starting to loosen, shoulders bowed under the burden of his own authority.

  I said, “I got it.”

  He nodded thanks.

  Nikki Kennedy came over. “Ready.”

  Moffett said to me, “See you on the other side.”

  CHAPTER 4

  5:09 a.m.

  Three hours along, I stood at the staging area, talking to Detective Jeremy Bischoff of Oakland PD Homicide Section. Lanky, with sparse mousy hair and a 49ers tie, he seemed annoyed that I’d taken it upon myself to call the jail and request a full drug panel for Meredith Klaar.

  “They’re supposed to do that anyway,” he said, draining his coffee.

  I made vague conciliatory noises. If he wanted to stand on ceremony, I could point out that it was disrespectful of him to keep putting me off, while Jasmine Gomez continued to lie in the street. I held my tongue. I couldn’t fault him for being strung out. Everyone was.

  Patience and diplomacy.

  I didn’t apologize, either. I’ve been in law enforcement long enough to know that supposed to doesn’t mean will. A ten-minute phone call can save a lot of future headache.

  I told him about Jasmine’s friend, Didi Flynn; I showed him Jasmine’s ID and said we were prepared to remove the decedent, unless he had any objections.

  “Yeah, knock yourself out.”

  He didn’t ask for Flynn’s number. Either he already had it or Jasmine wasn’t his priority. His mind was on the dead child.

  It’s natural for a person facing a swarm of horrors to sort, compare, weigh
merits.

  What can wait? What can’t? How will it play with the brass? The public?

  A young adult cut down is sad.

  As sad as a first-grader, bleeding out in his bed?

  What about the gut-shot, languishing on the operating table? If he didn’t make it, was that harder to accept because of the wasted effort? Or easier, because, hey: We tried.

  Ten thousand people die each year in Alameda County. As Bischoff jabbed at the coffeepot plunger, tipping the pot to coax out the dregs, people were dying, elsewhere. In hospice or at home or in an alley. In a thicket beside the freeway; in a motel room; surrounded by loved ones or alone.

  How sad can you afford to be, right now?

  Bischoff dumped his cup in the trash.

  “I’ll let you know about the autopsy,” I said.

  “Mm.” He was already walking away.

  * * *

  —

  NOBODY AT THE scene knew Jasmine Gomez. Nobody knew Didi Flynn. Or else they were lying and didn’t want to talk to me.

  The lone white flip-flop remained in the street. I bagged it, searched the area for its companion, came up empty-handed.

  My phone dinged, Amy texting.

  Are you ok

  On days when she goes into the city to see patients, she’s out of the house by eight. Otherwise she’ll snooze. Rarely had I seen her awake this early by choice.

  She hadn’t been able to get back to sleep.

  Don’t worry I’m fine I wrote.

  I’m watching it on tv

  I hesitated before responding. Was I live? Could she see me? The news helicopter was long departed. But there were still camera crews camped behind the cordon.

  You forgot your vest she wrote.

  Whoops.

  I know sorry

  Stay safe. Ly

  To my left, shrill beeps.

  A Coroner’s van was backing up to the barrier of black-and-whites.

  Ly 2 I wrote.

  The van came to a stop, and Lisa Shupfer, hair a nest, shirt bloused at one side, hopped out, frowning. She’d driven straight to the bureau from her home outside Sacramento, eighty-odd miles on four hours’ sleep.