by Eli Constant
I reach as deep as I can, trying to make sure that the victim’s spirit was really not clinging on. And then I feel it, like the most tentative touch inside my mind.
The feel of it reminds me of the difference between a body and its connected spirit when it is in its natural state and when it has been prepared for burial with embalming. I visualize the words in my grandmother’s diary again, how she describes how the bodies feel before and after they’ve been embalmed, how the absence of blood and bodily fluids changes the aura around the deceased.
And I realize that that is why I did not feel the body in Lake Moultrie, that is why I was not drawn to its spirit, so wasted and quiet in the waters. Just like Maggie and the Jane Doe, this body has been embalmed.
I’m almost there, seeing in double vision—the body building slowly so that I can see who the victim was in life. Only her face comes together in completion and I know now that it is because the body is no longer in its natural state. But her face is familiar. So familiar, not just because it resembles the two victims already identified, but because I have personally seen it before.
In a picture handed to me by a grieving father with an odd funeral request.
The truth I now hold makes me not want to see his body. Timothy Barrington, born Amanda Barrington. A young man never accepted by his mother. A young man whose childhood dog had just died. A young man whose boyfriend would speak at his funeral.
Allen Barrington would get his wish—a proper send off for his son—the only change was that I could now confirm that his son was dead and that we would be burying two bodies instead of only Rosemary’s cancer-struck frame.
I realize, as I’m picturing Timothy’s face, that I have stopped moving. I’m staring at nothing, unable to bring myself closer to the spot that has been cleared away. I do not want to see him trapped in the ice.
“Tori, you okay?” Terrance is looking at me and so are the other three people standing around. The one with the camera directs the lens at me and he snaps a photo. I can hear the soft click of the shutter closing and opening again. I don’t recognize these people. I don’t like that. I don’t like new faces.
Some rich man had renovated a decrepit mansion on the outskirts of Bonneau though, and he’d started investing in the town—one thing he’d wanted was a stronger police force, better forensics. I’d like to meet the man and give him a firm slap. But no one had even really seen him, just heard the rumors. Bonneau really did attract the ‘strange’.
“Don’t take my damn picture.” I spit out the words. I don’t want to be immortalized, now when I am seeing this poor man laid to waste by a cruel and practiced hand.
“Put the camera down,” Terrance murmurs at the man.
“She the one we were waiting for?” Another man looks me up and down; I focus on his face, giving him my best ‘eat shit’ expression.
“Yes.”
“She’s a civilian. What’s her expertise?” The man looks like he’d rather get my phone number than my opinion on the victim. It makes me feel all kinds of skeevy and I, to my discredit, squirm a bit under his gaze.
“She owns the funeral home across the street. Her expertise is embalming and if you’ve taken a close enough look at our victim here,” he points to the cleared patch of ice, “and you had half a brain in your damn head, then you’d know that she’s been embalmed. Or at least, her body has been treated in some unusual way after death. So I called her in to look before we disturb the remains. Does that answer your question fully enough?” Terrance waits for the questioner to respond. I speak first.
“He,” I correct automatically without thinking.
“What?” Terrance looks at me and everyone else is looking at me again, too, right after Terrance has said what he could to get them to leave me the hell alone. I’m super intelligent sometimes.
“I’m not sure what kind of an expert you are, but if you actually look at the body, you’ll know the gender was female. It doesn’t take a genius.” It’s the man with the camera. He doesn’t sound exactly unkind, but he doesn’t sound like he’s hopping with happiness that I’m here. The third man’s stood completely silent through the whole exchange, smoking a cigarette like this is just any other Tuesday and Lake Moultrie is a hotbed for murder victims. I wish I could be that nonchalant about the whole thing. But all I can see now is Allen and the way his grief consumed him.
“I’m sorry; this just reminds me of something else. And then, it wasn’t a woman who’d died.” I try to center myself as I walk forward.
“Why don’t you three take a break? When she’s done, we’ll get the body out.”
“Doug just wants us to cut around and transport the body in ice. He doesn’t want us to risk damaging evidence.”
Terrance nods, “Yeah, I know. I’ve got a guy coming out here to do it for us—a local contractor. He’s got a six foot saw. We’re going to sink eyebolts before he cuts through to the water and attach it to a portable lift that we can roll across the ice. I can’t think of any other way to do it.”
“Damn Rising and what it did to our weather. This would never have happened before the war.” It was the man with the cigarette, the end of it glowing in the weather like an ember trapped by the frosty air, just like the body is trapped.
I’m finally at the yellow tape, it presses against my upper thighs softly as I lean forward and see Timothy in the ice.
I know they all see Amanda. The killer made sure of that.
He is lovely, but not in the way that he was truly lovely. In life, where he’d discovered his true identity, an identity that his father and boyfriend both cherished. I can see dark, long hair, flowing in the ice like each strand has been placed with purpose. That is not possible, but that is what it seems like—like within the ice a wind is blowing, carrying the hair in a lovely, uninterrupted wave.
The little wave of spirit touches me again, licking at my body. He’s not strong enough though, to reach out and really let me see him.
I say nothing as the three other men shuffle past me and head towards the shore. I wait for Terrance to speak, indicating that they are out of ear shot.
“You said he. That wasn’t a mistake was it?”
“No, not a mistake.” I swallow, my eyes picking over every detail, and it’s amazing how well the glassy ice is cooperating. It is crystal clear, barely a bubble preventing our view of the body it holds. The pale blue dress he’s wearing has white buttons at the collar. One hand is so near the surface that I can see the tiny white crescents at the base of each nail. They have been manicured, lovingly filed down and painted a translucent pink. The shoes he wears are the same shade, a baby girl’s hue full of innocent promise.
I want to fall to my hands and knees and claw through the ice to him, to take off the things that ruin his sense of self. “His name is Timothy Barrington.”
“He told you that, just now?”
“No, his father told me that when he came to talk to me about holding a funeral for his son who’d disappeared. We weren’t going to have a body, but he needed closure.”
Terrance says nothing when I do fall to my knees, bringing my face too close to the ice and to Timothy’s frozen expression. I reel backwards, rising away from the surprise I can still make out in his very dead eyes. The yellow tape is a barrier again.
“Can you feel him now?”
“Yes, but he’s faint. I think he’s scared. Murder victims nearly always stay around for a while, so long that they start to deteriorate. Any spirit with unfinished business can do that and many are lost to the anti-ether if they can’t find resolution.”
“That’s interesting.” Terrance does take out his notebook now.
“You can’t write that down.” My heart jumps a little.
He hasn’t opened the notebook and he looks torn. “I’m never going to remember all of this.” He sighs, slipping the pad back into his pocket.
“Ask the same questions over and over. I’ll be here.”
“It’d be easie
r if I had my own reference.”
“Sure, that won’t ever fall into the wrong hands.” I say sarcastically.
“Fine, fine. I’ll only record things that could have been discovered by honest-to-god police work.” Terrance doesn’t seem happy, but shit, it’s my ass on the line if his precious little police notebook gets misplaced. Not that he’d be idiot enough to write down where he got the information. Ha. Actually, maybe they’d institutionalize him for writing about spirits and unfinished business and leave little ole me alone. In a perfect world.
“Thank you.”
“Yeah, yeah. Okay, tell me what else you can get out of this.” He gestures around. “I’ve got guys ready to go home for the day.”
“Well they can fucking wait, because this poor guy’s never going home.” I sound bitter. But whatever. I can’t always be sunshine and ice cream.
Terrance gives me an ‘I can only justify your presence for so long’ look and I take the hint. “Okay, something else important. I didn’t realize it until now, but when a body is embalmed, something changes about them. There’s a different aura around the spirit. And I didn’t tell you this before at the morgue, but I can sort of… taste blood? I can feel it and read it like a book. And because of that, I could taste that Maggie’s blood had been replaced before she’d died. Even though all of her blood was gone and she was just bones. I’d recognized it before, because shit, I work with the stuff every day. Embalming fluid. I think we’re missing something really key here.”
“What’s that?” Terrance doesn’t look surprised in the slightest.
“If they’ve been embalmed, then it’s been by someone who, like me, knows what’s needed and how it’s done.”
“No, we’ve thought of that. We’ve talked to half a dozen funeral parlors already.”
I should have figured they’d have thought of that. They were the police after all. “But it doesn’t have to be a funeral director, Terrance. There are other professions that use these types of fluids, that preserve bodies so that they can be displayed.”
A light goes on in Terrance’s eyes. “Like a Taxidermist.”
“Exactly. I’m not a hundred percent sure, but I think they’re formula has more arsenic in it. Not that that matters. The big thing is—they have to order it from somewhere. I use a supplier in Comer, Georgia and I’m pretty sure it’s known for serving all of the southeast states.”
“Why don’t we just start with one of the creepiest guys in Berkley County?”
I quirk an eyebrow, wondering who he means. “Who would that be?”
“Mordecai Jones, owner of Louis D. Taxidermy right on the border of Williamsburg County.”
“Timothy was from Georgetown. He disappeared on trip to a friend’s house in Carris. Where were the other victims from?”
“Maggie disappeared during the war. You were right about that, with the clothes. It was the kind of thing people made when we couldn’t get textiles. End of the war maybe, given the fabric pattern. The Jane Doe was after that by a few years, at least according to the coroner’s notes. And we don’t know where she’s from.”
“Right, never identified.” I sigh, thinking. Racking my brain for connections. “Do you really think he waited this many years to kill again or,” I looked out over the ice-covered lake, “or do you think there are more bodies waiting to be found.”
“I think maybe our friend either laid low after the first two or he wasn’t in a position to kill.”
“Like he went to jail for something or moved away?”
“I’m thinking the first one. Guys like this, they don’t leave their work behind willingly.”
“Has this Mordecai Jones done time?”
“Yes, fifteen years for working the black market. It would fit with the second murder. He was released about two and a half years ago.”
“So he fits.”
“He fits.”
“How do you know so much about him?”
“I was a rookie and a rookie doesn’t forget his first arrest and he keeps tabs on him. Or at least I kept tabs on him. It’s a bit odd, but I look at him as my good luck charm. He was the easiest damn arrest, didn’t even put up a fight despite knowing what he was charged with.”
“He doesn’t sound like a cold blooded killer, Terrance.”
“People are walking secrets, Tori. You of all people should know that.”
I nod, knowing he’s right.
“Are you guys done yet, Chief? We’re all freezing our asses off!” It’s the young cop with the mouse brown eyes yelling across the lake.
“I need a few more minutes to see if I can draw him out.” I say, moving once again past the yellow tape, this time meaning to.
“Almost.” Terrance yells back. Groans erupt on the shore. I don’t care.
I reach down into the ice with my power, feeling it blossoming like static electricity across my skin and making the little hairs stand on end. I try to let Timothy’s spirit know that I’m good, that I won’t hurt him. He can come out. I’ve dealt with fearful souls before, but nothing like this. The feelings piercing my heart are agonizing. He has not just been murdered, he’s been dehumanized, debased, made to feel like he wasn’t good enough the way he was.
The killer stole him because he was anatomically a woman, because he could be made to look like his other victims. A near perfect match with his lovely face and beautiful eyes. It sickened me. It was more perverse than anything I’d ever encountered. This killer made Mr. Donahue look like a damn saint.
Finally, like mist rising off of a lake in the dead of summer when the weather has cooled just enough overnight, he comes together in front of me, until he is kneeling with me on the ice and staring at me with an open, frightened gaze. He has long hair and makeup and he’s wearing the blue dress. His manicured hands are folding across his lap. I am seeing the persona that has been forced upon him by the killer. I had hoped that the killer did not infringe upon his identity while he was still alive, but seeing the memory of it so alive and well within his spirit, I feel that the killer made him dress like a woman before he died.
That was so much worse in some way.
“Hi, Timothy.” I say his name tentatively, not knowing who he will now relate to—the woman the killer has created or who he was in life.
“Thank you for that.” His words coming before his lipstick-stained mouth actually moves, as if he does not have full command of his body. Like Maggie.
“For what?”
“Calling me Timothy.” The tears are there before I can take a breath to prepare myself for them. They are little untouchable drops skimming down his see-through face.
I cannot stand seeing a soul cry. There is something so heart-wrenching about it. We should be happy in death after leading long, happy lives. This outcome is unnatural. This outcome of sadness. Yet, it is the outcome all too often.
When the tears are spent, Timothy’s spirit shakes itself lightly and seems to slough off the stiffness, like he is dissolving the wires running through his remains until he is a real boy again. He looks himself—short cropped, almost buzzed hair, thick black glasses and a single heart earring.
“Timothy, can you tell me anything about the person who killed you?”
He shakes his head. “No, he wore a mask. And his hands were weird. Rubbery looking. Blue maybe?”
“You’re sure it was a him though?”
“Yes, I mean I think so. He was smaller than a lot of men, but he had to go to the bathroom at one point and he stood and went in a sink instead of going to a toilet.”
I nod. “A man.”
Terrance is standing close enough to listen. I know he can only hear my side of the conversation.
“Is there anything else? Can you tell me how you were taken?”
“I was getting gas on the way to Dan’s house. I’d just finished pumping and paid and a cloth was pressed over my mouth. I remember getting shoved into the back of my own car with someone beside me holding my head, but that’s
about it. I don’t know how far we drove or anything.”
I pause, thinking. “Someone beside you, but also someone driving?”
“Yeah, I think so. I blacked out and didn’t wake up until it was getting light outside. A basement. It smelled awful.”
“Like chemicals?”
“I guess. I’ve not been around that stuff much, except for maybe a few experiments here and there in high school.”
“Is there anything else, anything at all?”
He nods, tilting his head as if he’s trying to remember something. “Wind chimes.”
“Wind chimes.” I repeat, listening to Terrance scribbling now in his notebook.
“There was a small window and when the sun was coming up before…” his voice trails off and then comes back again, but it is not as strong as it was. He is turning back into the weak whisper against my power, even his corporal form is wavering. “I could hear wind chimes. They must have been hung right outside the window.”
“Thank you, Timothy. You can go now, if you’re ready.”
“Am I ready?”
“Only you know.” I reach out to him and he reaches out to me and our hands pass through one another as if we both do not exist at all.
“Will you tell Darnell something for me? And my father too?”
I didn’t ask; I just assumed that Darnell was his boyfriend. “Of course.”
“Will you tell Darnell that I wouldn’t have gone off to Columbia, not if he didn’t want me to, and that I love him. And tell my dad I’m sorry and that I love him too, more than anything. He let me be who I am. He never made me feel less than. Not like mom.” So many tears.