1 Who, What, Where, When, Die

by Amanda M. Lee

  Pastor Lenny was whispering in the corner with one of the counselors. He stood up suddenly, mustered as much false bravado as possible, and said, "I'm going to stand guard outside. Everyone remember, God will protect you if you truly believe."

  I was hoping God would smite the hell out of him some time soon -- but I had a feeling I was the only one.

  I looked around at the assembly of teenagers in the barn and realized pretty quickly that I was the only one who wasn't upset -- well at least about something that didn't resemble an herbal supplement. That struck me as odd -- especially since the acting by the adults in this situation had been abysmal.

  I was about to make my feelings on the situation known when there was a scuffle down below. The pastor was locked in combat with a man in blue jeans who was wearing a red bandana tied around his face like he was a bank robber in an old western -- I kid you not.

  The "bandit" then proceeded to shoot the pastor at point blank range -- causing everyone in the loft to scream and cluster together in terror. Everyone, that is, but me.

  I'd played enough cops and robbers during my youth to know the sound and smell of a cap gun. The fact that no one else realized it was aggravating to me. What a bunch of sheep.

  The "bandit" looked up and made eye contact, tipping his hat in a way I was sure was meant to be sinister. It just came across as cartoonish.

  "Dude, you need a mustache to twirl." I never did know when to keep my mouth shut.

  For his part, the pastor was playing his "death" to the hilt, falling on a bale of hay dramatically and jerking a few times before lying still.

  I could have approached this situation in two ways: I could go along with the skit or I could blow them out of the water. Can you guess which way I went?

  I sat down at the edge of the loft, hooked my legs over the edge, reached into the pocket of my flannel shirt and extracted the joint I'd been saving since I'd been sent to crackpot camp. I lit the joint, inhaled for a few seconds, and then made my presence profoundly known when I exhaled.

  "I love the smell of cap guns in the morning."

  Needless to say, things fell apart after that. The pastor got up from the ground (Hallelujah, it's a miracle!) and confiscated my herb. We were all taken back to the camp and I was locked in the chapel again to think about what I'd done.

  Personally, I was pretty proud about what I'd done, but no one else seemed to share in my take on the day's events. Instead, they were all commenting on what a wonderful exercise it was about liberalism and how they were trying to take God away from everybody – starting with the schools.

  During my exile in the chapel that night, I formed a plan. There was no way I was going to spend another night in this cesspool.

  The next morning, Pastor Lenny came in and asked me what I thought about the previous day.

  "I think you're crazy." I saw no reason to lie.

  "You think that I'm crazy when you're the one walking around with marijuana in your pocket?"

  "Oh, I'm sorry, you're bat shit crazy," I corrected myself.

  Instead of going to breakfast that morning, I excused myself to shower first. In reality, when I was sure everyone was in the mess hall, I grabbed my bags (which had never been unpacked) and took off into the surrounding woods.

  I knew roughly what area I was in. I stowed my bags in a place I figured I could find again -- extracted the final joint I had hidden in a shoe in the bag -- and set off walking. I figured if I could just find a gas station then I could call my parents -- or even my boyfriend, Jake -- and this whole nightmare would be over.

  Here's the thing about pot, though. You should never smoke it and then go for a hike. Even if you have a good sense of direction -- which I don't -- you could get easily turned around and that's exactly what happened to me.

  I spent the next six hours wandering in the woods -- never reaching a road or finding my way back to the camp. It wasn't until dark was almost upon me that I heard a strange noise -- it was a helicopter.

  I could continue with this long and sordid story -- but it's really unnecessary. Suffice it to say, my jaunt into the woods had created some sort of media sensation in Michigan -- with everyone out looking for me. I'd been oblivious to the hoopla.

  When the cops did find me, however, they had some stern words about what I'd done and how not everything was always about me.

  "Young lady, you're going to find that your place in this world is actually very small and one day you're going to realize that you're not the center of everyone's world," the cop who dropped me off at my house told me as I departed his cruiser.

  Why that story had just popped into my head a full thirteen years later is anyone's guess -- but I think it had something to do with the sheriff's deputy yelling at me to keep away from his crime scene.

  "That's a dead body ma'am," he yelled. "You need to maintain your distance."

  "I just want to see."

  "Well, ma'am, I don't care what you want. It's really not about you, is it?" Why does everyone keep telling me that?

  What was funny about this situation was that I hadn't actually been sent out on a story to see this dead body – I’d just shown up to work and it was in the parking lot at the building where I worked.

  My name is Avery Shaw and for the last five years I'd been working as a reporter for the Macomb Monitor in Macomb County, Michigan. In the years since my parents thought I needed to learn about discipline as a teenager, I'd actually embraced a lack of discipline as my own personal mantra.

  As far as dead bodies go -- I'd seen my fair share.

  As I approached the crime scene, I could see my friend and co-worker Marvin Potts trying to slip under the police tape behind the obnoxious officer who was fixated on me so he could get a closer look at the body. I had no idea who it was, but I could just see a perfectly manicured pink fingernail poking out from beneath the sheet. It was obviously a woman.

  "Who is it?"

  The deputy pointed to an area just over my right shoulder instead of answering me.

  "What?"

  "Ma'am, if you could please move over there . . . "

  "Just tell me who it is."

  "Yeah, tell her who it is." Marvin joined the conversation, while quickly lifting up the sheet to get a glimpse of who was underneath it. I couldn't be sure, but I was fairly certain it was our editorial secretary, Darby.

  "Is that Darby?"

  Marvin swallowed hard, nodding grimly as he dropped the sheet back over Darby's body and stepped away. Marvin is fascinated and terrified by death all at the same time.

  The deputy had just caught sight of him and was making his way over to Marvin with a purpose. I think that purpose involved beating him with his nightstick. Do cops still carry those things around?

  Marvin quickly slipped back over to the other side of the police tape, trying to hide himself amongst the throng of workers who had came out to see the fuss. I'm not sure his method of hiding was actually working, especially since he stood out like a sore thumb in his polyester black pants, white shirt and suspenders, but the deputy gave up his futile pursuit and returned his gaze to me.

  I steadfastly ignored him.

  I was trying to access my brain for information on Darby. If I remembered correctly, Darby's only transgression in life – that I knew of, at least -- had been narrowly surviving the latest round of layoffs to the detriment of another editorial secretary who felt she should stay and Darby should leave.

  No one else in the building agreed.

  I noticed that when Marvin dropped the sheet back over Darby's pallid features that he hadn't done so properly and a lock of her mousy brown hair was now poking out from beneath the sheet.

  I felt a profound sense of sadness as I regarded her body. Usually I'm pretty ambivalent at a crime scene, but this is someone I actually knew.

  I tucked a piece of my own bright blonde, shoulder length hair behind my ear (sunshine blonde according to the bottle I touched my roots up with monthly) and wondered
what it would be like to be dead.

  Well crap. Who needs that?

  I turned to make my way around the crime scene and into the building when I ran into the last person I wanted to see this early in the morning -- especially since I'd been half asleep when I applied my makeup. Macomb County's finest, Jake Farrell, the county sheriff.

  "What are you doing here?"

  Jake and I had a tortured history. As kids we played Star Wars and G.I. Joe in the woods behind my house. As teenagers we played doctor in the backseat of his car. As adults we flirted occasionally and yelled a lot. Lately, we were in a holding pattern, with neither one of us willing to make the first move to try an actual relationship or be the first one to put the kibosh on any future attempts.

  A few weeks ago I'd almost been killed when a former department of public works employee had flew off the deep end. Jake had been there for me through the ordeal -- but once everything had been settled, he disappeared faster than the Millennium Falcon on the Kessel Run.

  Jake smiled at me uncertainly when his gaze finally met mine. He took in my new Star Wars Abbey Road shirt, and I could see him shake his head slightly in amusement. For his part, his jet-black hair was in its usual messy bird’s nest. Jake was the youngest sheriff in Macomb County history. He was two years older than me in age, but ten in maturity. Did I mention that he was hot? Hey, there may be a dead body in the parking lot but the man could stop traffic when he smiled.

  "I heard there was a dead body in the Monitor's parking lot," he said, his dark brown eyes flashing impatiently. "I wanted to make sure it wasn't you."

  "Why would you think it's me?"

  "I don't know, maybe it's your bright and sunny personality?" I knew sarcasm when I heard it. The problem was, he was right. Darby had never ticked anyone off -- while I had never met anyone that I didn't like to tick off. It was an interesting dichotomy.

  I glared at Jake, who was clearly enjoying my discomfort.

  "Well, as you can see, it's not me."

  "Do you know her?"

  "Yeah, she's an editorial secretary."

  "Meaning she does what?"

  "Basically just busy work. Obituaries, photo assignments, briefs. No real writing."

  "So you're saying that she probably didn't do a story that someone didn't like?"

  I was surprised. "You think this is work-related?"

  "Well, she was shot at work."

  "She was shot!"

  Jake grabbed my elbow roughly. "Can you keep your voice down? I swear to God, you just don't think before you yell."

  "Sorry, I thought she fell or something."

  "No, she didn't fall."

  "Where was she shot?"

  "We think it was right here. We can't find any blood anywhere else."

  "I know that. I mean, where was she shot on her body?"

  "Her chest."

  "How many times?"

  "What? Are you writing a book?"

  "No, I'm just curious. This is what we do. You can't expect us to not be curious. I bet you a hundred bucks I have to write obits and briefs for her today. This is going to suck. Maybe I should fake being sick." I was mostly talking to myself at this point.

  Jake blew out a sigh.

  "What was that for?"

  "You wear on me."

  "Why? Because I want to know how many times she was shot?"

  "No, because every time I talk to you I picture myself beating my own head into a brick wall."

  "That's nice."

  "You remember when we were kids and you created that big media firestorm by taking off into the woods because you were in a snit about that church camp?"

  "I was not in a snit!"

  "Yes, you were. You were convinced they were some sort of weird cult."

  "They were."

  "This reminds me of that situation."

  "Why?"

  "Because back then you weren't even remotely worried about all the people out looking for you. All you were worried about was you."

  "How is that like now?"

  "Because here you have a co-worker dead in front of you and you're worried about how this is going to affect you."

  I opened my mouth to argue -- but part of me recognized the wisdom of his words. Unfortunately, it didn't stop me from arguing.

  "She's beyond caring about obits okay," I said. "Some of us are left here to suffer."

  Jake merely shook his head and walked away.

  Books by Amanda M. Lee

  Avery Shaw Mysteries

  Who, What, Where, When, Die

  If it Bleeds, it Leads

  Buried Leads

  Covenant College Mysteries

  Awakening (Book One)

  Whispering (Book Two) Coming in October 2013

  Wicked Witches of the Midwest Mysteries

  Any Witch Way You Can

  Every Witch Way But Wicked