NOIR VIGNETTE

I got tired of reading about female detectives who always ate salad for lunch, are they a bunch of rabbits or what? So I wrote a little something myself for the giggle.

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It was a gray day in my customary gray life. I had just finished my usual lunch of a double shot of Jameson and ten cigarettes when my door slammed open and a lad stumbled into my office and fell to his knees at my feet. I looked down and said, “so what can I do for you, other than spread my legs?” I’ve always believed that a short, sharp shock is necessary to bring someone to his senses. It worked; he jumped to his feet and looked me in the eye. When I saw his face, I realized this boy was quite beautiful and I was reconsidering putting my question in a more positive vein until I saw the blood on his hands. Damn, I thought, can’t things be simple just for once?

“Okay darlin’ just what is it you think you need from me?” I asked him as I guided him to a chair, offered him a smoke and proffered my treasured skull Zippo to light him up
He replied, “someone just killed my buddy and I know they’ll think it’s me”
“Yeah,” I said, “considering the blood on your hands you’d be my number one candidate. So tell me what happened?”
“Its like this, we were at the local bar havin’ a few drinks the other night when we got into a heated argument and I punched him.” This led to a knock down, drag out fight until the barkeep tossed them both out. They sobered up a bit when they hit the cold, wet pavement, had a good laugh and went their separate ways. That was two nights ago and he hadn’t seen his buddy until this morning. Or more precisely, he’d seen his buddy’s body casually draped over the steering wheel of his car.

“So what kind of car did your buddy drive?” He looked at me stupefied as if I had asked him an idiotic question.
“What difference does it make?” he sputtered.
“I’m looking for a car and figured his was available.”
The lad’s face turned purple and he half rose from his chair shouting at me. “You fuckin’ bitch! He was my friend.” Well, hell you can’t fault a woman for having her priorities straight. If I was gonna chase this case, I’d definitely need wheels.

I poured him a shot, lit him up again and got him back into the chair. “Sweetie, calm down, I’m just trying to cover all the angles.” For the next hour I listened to him as he told me about his buddy, from the day they’d met in prison till that night they hit the bar to celebrate his buddy’s acquittal for manslaughter.

“So honey, tell me when and where you found your buddy this morning?” Turns out they were supposed to meet up at their local gym for an early workout. When he arrived his buddy wasn’t inside so he checked out the parking lot in back where he found his friend’s car. Thinking it was odd that the car was there but his buddy wasn’t he tried to look into the windscreen but it was so filthy he couldn’t see anything. That’s when he decided to try to open the door and where he found his buddy draped over the steering wheel with a bullet right between his eyes. In an effort to comfort the lad I said, “the best way to go is with one right between the eyes, he never felt a thing.”
“Yeah I’ve heard that,” he muttered. He went on to tell me that he moved the body to be sure that it really was his buddy and that’s how he got the blood on his hands.
“Did you call the police?”

“Hell no, I got my ass out of there as fast as I could. I’m an ex-con, they’d be all over me for sure.”
“Do you know anyone who would want to kill your friend?”
“Nah, we’re just small time hoods and the manslaughter thing my buddy was up for was the result of a fight he got into with a neighbor who was roughing up his wife. Everyone hated the guy, he beat the wife and his kids, no one was sorry to see him go.

“There’s one more thing I need to know. Why did you come here?”
“Well, Mom, you’re the detective, where else should I have gone?”
“Damn, kid, is that you? It’s been five years since you bothered to get in touch with me.”
“Yeah, but I was inside for two years and I’ve been laying low since then.”
“You’ve changed, I guess doing time didn’t do you too much harm. Sorry I had to turn you in but I had to draw the line somewhere.”
“Make this go away and I’ll forgive you Mom.”

Kids, they always want something.

© Bette O’Callaghan