by Vic Kerry
“Come on,” Cybil said. “That siren means the parade has started. We’ve got to hurry to get in place. We’re already not going to get on the barrier. We’ll have to fight with all sorts of people for beads.”
“Maybe I should go back to the car and wait. I’m going to be a wet blanket.”
“Don’t worry about it. You already are. Plus, I plan on drinking after this. You’ll be sitting there a long time waiting.” She smiled. “Maybe you can get a couple of drinks in you and help lighten your mood.”
Ashe liked the idea of being able to down a few beers in a loud crowded bar where people might not know him, but certainly wouldn’t sympathize with him. He nodded and started behind her. Cybil turned up the next street and cut through an alley. He followed her, until they came out on a busy street. All sorts of people milled around on the sidewalk. The air felt electric. People screamed and laughed. Cybil grabbed him by the wrist again and pulled him along. Finally they pushed through a group, elbowing them until they stood at a metal barricade.
“What are you doing?” a scruffy-looking man asked when Cybil pushed him to the side to get a place at the edge of the street.
“I’m here for the parade,” she said with no fear in her voice. “You got a problem?”
“You need to get your girlfriend under control,” the man said to Ashe.
“I’m not his girlfriend, you insensitive prick. She died yesterday, so why don’t you step off before I shove my Doc Marten so far into your groin that you’ll think you’re eating oysters.”
Cybil stuck her chest out at him like a rooster prancing before the hens in his barnyard. The scruffy man backed down. He shook his head and slipped into the group of people behind him.
“That was a little bit—”
“Ballsy?”
“Scary. He could’ve broken you in half,” Ashe said.
“And I could have made him taste his own foreskin for a month.” She smiled and clambered onto the metal barrier as two police motorcycles passed.
Ashe looked up as the first float rolled down the street. A banner lit with LCD Christmas lights read The Buttercups: Ode to Joy. The float had a huge bust of Beethoven rotating on a platform. Revelers in powdered wigs and sequined harlequin masks wore candy-colored costumes that looked like tailed tuxedo jackets with matching knee britches and stockings. A shower of green, purple and gold bead necklaces rained down on the crowd. Ashe put his hand up to block the hard plastic beads from hitting him in the face. A few of the necklaces tangled in his fingers.
“Put them on,” Cybil yelled at him while holding her hands out to the float.
She’d stripped off her coat and scarf. Several strings of Mardi Gras beads hung around her neck. He pulled the two necklaces over his head. They hung loose on him. A small brass band walked between the floats. They played some jazz song that didn’t sound like any song in particular.
“How’s this?” he asked.
“You look better, but you’ve got to want those things. The first float will toss out things without any real reason. The later ones are a bit pickier. They usually have better stuff too.” Cybil yelled as a masked man on horseback trotted by. He handed her a string of beads the size of silver dollars. Each looked like a multicolored mirror ball at a prom. “I got a fifth of Jack last year.”
“Really. How did you get that?”
The next float came past. A cheap plastic toy hit Ashe in the head. He turned to the float and held his hands up again to block getting hit more than to catch something. A young-looking man with a bright red Venetian mask with a long beak-like nose taunted the crowd with a plush toy that looked like an alien giving the finger.
“Like this,” Cybil said.
Ashe looked over to see her lifting her top up, revealing her small breasts. The cold air made her pinkish nipples stand erect. He looked away but not before the image of her fist-sized milky breasts was seared into his memory. The big-nosed parade reveler tossed the alien to Cybil while giving her a big thumbs-up and flicking his tongue out.
“You have to be careful doing that though. The cops don’t like it too much here in Mobile. You can usually get away with it at Bienville Square or on this stretch.”
Ashe looked back at her while a high school band played a march as they passed. She shoved the stuffed toy into her pocket and readied herself to catch more beads. He turned back to the parade as well. Ethics training kept rolling over in his head as did the image of Marianne lying naked on the morgue table. The orderly jiggled her breasts in his memory instead of pointing at them like on the video. He saw in his mind’s eye Cybil’s boobs bouncing up and down as she tried to get that alien.
Beads flew at Ashe. He caught some but let others go. As the parade progressed, he caught a few small silver-cellophane wrapped MoonPies that he shoved in his coat pockets. Some playful reveler on a float shaped like a piano with everyone dressed like Elton John on The Muppet Show tossed him a pair of thong panties. He shoved those quickly into his pocket before anyone saw them. Without being aware, he laughed at times. Toward the end he even looked over at Cybil without feeling guilty or embarrassed.
Red and white strobe lights flashed. A siren accompanied the lights. Cybil hopped off the metal barrier. She took him by the hand and pulled him back onto the sidewalk. A fire engine rolled past, and several men in coveralls with City of Mobile printed on the breast pocket came down the line of barriers. They lifted them up and slammed them back to the sidewalk. Ashe barely had his feet out of the gutter before the barrier slammed into the cement.
“You can get a hurt ankle if you’re not fast enough,” Cybil said. “Since you’re a virgin and everything, I figured you wouldn’t know about that.”
Ashe knew she meant he was a virgin to the Mardi Gras experience, but he felt like a gawky awkward teen boy who had just gotten to second base and was hoping to round third. A large wad of shiny metallic colored beads rested on the small bumps of breast that he’d just seen her flash. Although he knew it was wrong and that thinking of stuff like that was not what he should be focused on right now, he wanted to see her breasts again.
“Thanks. The last thing I need is a broken ankle,” he said, making eye contact with her as quickly as he could and hoping that it didn’t seem like he was intentionally doing it. “I guess we head back to campus now?”
“If that’s what you want to do,” Cybil said.
“It’s a school night.” He felt like such a geek saying that. “I’ve skipped too many classes lately. The university isn’t paying me not to teach.”
She looped her arm under his and started walking. He followed her lead. They moved with the current of revelers making their way down Dauphin Street.
“Maybe they should,” she said.
“Should what?”
“Pay you for not teaching. I’ve heard your lectures.”
He looked down at his student worker. She smiled at him. He laughed.
“Maybe we could stop in for a drink.” He paused in front of a bar called Grand Central.
“That’s fine, but not here,” she said. “There’s a better place about a block away. It’s less crowded and well, less that.” She pointed to a few people going in who looked like stereotypical college students.
“Sounds good; lead the way.”
Cybil pulled him down the street. All different sorts of people passed them as they moved slowly down the sidewalk. A few people dressed in evening wear with feather masks on laughed as they shoved past. Parents with small children weighed down in bead necklaces did the same. Ashe looked down at his feet as they walked. He didn’t feel like making eye contact with anyone. Embarrassment burned at the edges of his psyche. If they ran into a colleague, he would be caught for sure, even though he hadn’t done a single thing wrong.
His shoulder knocked hard into someone walking the opposite way. He looked up to apologize. A tall,
slender black woman stood staring at him. Her eyes were amber and seemed distant but intent. They pierced into his. A feeling of déjà vu hit him as if he knew the woman from somewhere. He tried to think if she was on the faculty at Alabama Tech.
“I’m sorry,” he said, letting Cybil’s arm slip from his.
“No worries, friend,” she said back with a flat tone. “I should have been watching where I was going.”
“I didn’t hurt you did I?” he asked.
“No, friend.”
He felt Cybil’s lips close to his ear. She whispered, “I think she must be some kind of religious nut.”
“Have you been enjoying the parade and festivities?” the woman asked.
“Yes,” Ashe said. “It was my first parade ever.”
“Here comes the sermon,” Cybil whispered again.
“I am the president of a new parading society, the Mystics of Mayhem. We will be parading on Mardi Gras night starting at 11:15 p.m., promptly. It would be appreciated if you came out to support us on our first year of revelry.”
“Sounds fun,” Cybil said. “How did a new society get that time so close to the end of the festival?”
“It is amazing what money will do.” The woman laughed, but it sounded very artificial and forced to Ashe.
The president of the Mystics of Mayhem began to give him the creeps. Her stare never changed, and he hadn’t noticed her blinking.
“We’ll try to come, but I can’t promise anything. It’s still a while off,” he said.
“I understand, but remember Mystics of Mayhem on Mardi Gras night promptly at 11:15 p.m. We have to be finished by 11:59.”
“Why is that?” he asked.
“Because Lent starts at midnight,” she said as if everyone should know that.
“Thank you,” Cybil said and pulled Ashe down the street.
He looked back at the woman, who walked toward the bar Grand Central. Her steps looked stiff, but nothing else struck him as out of the ordinary.
“That was a strange lady,” he said.
“Most of them are,” Cybil said.
“Most of whom? Ladies?”
“No, presidents of parading societies. I’ve met a few while trying to get tickets to a ball. You’d be surprised what they expect people to do for those things.”
“Like flash.” Ashe didn’t mean to say it, but the words just slipped out.
“I guess I should be embarrassed that my boss has seen my boobs, but I had to have that alien. They’re my thing.”
Cybil paused in the street and let her coat slip from her shoulder. She reached and pulled down the neck of her shirt to show the part of her back at her shoulders. A green alien head with big eyes stared up at Ashe. Its eyes seemed livelier than those of the woman they had just spoken with.
“That’s…”
“Cool.” She pulled her coat back up.
“Weird.”
She slipped her arm back through his and pointed down the street. “The bar is just around the corner.”
Traffic Camera: Corner of Dauphin and Conti Streets, Mobile, AL, 9:19 p.m. CST
Marianne walks across the middle of the intersection ignoring any traffic that is on the street. An SUV brakes violently before hitting her. The driver, a bulky man wearing a trucker hat, jumps out of his car. He walks up to Marianne and jabs his hands in the air at her, but she keeps walking slowly toward the other side of the road.
The driver reaches out and grabs her by the shoulder. She turns on him, grabbing his arm. He falls to his knees as she turns his forearm over. After letting him go, Marianne continues across the street. The driver kneels in the middle of the intersection. He screams at the sky and holds his arm, which dangles at his side. A woman climbs from the passenger side of the SUV. She helps the man up and back to the SUV. Then she looks down the street at Marianne. She takes a step in that direction, but then hurries to her SUV. The vehicle speeds through the intersection.
Chapter Four
Ashe waited at the bar for their drinks. Cybil had disappeared into the crowd to find a place to sit. Despite what she’d told him, this bar seemed more crowded than the one he’d wanted to go in. Everyone around him appeared to be of the same fashion persuasion as Cybil. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in a place with so many people dressed in black and neon colors.
“Here you go.” The bartender placed two longneck beers on the counter in front of him.
Ashe handed him his credit card. When he received his card back with his receipt, he waded into the people, looking for Cybil. The whole place smelled like clove cigarettes and the music that thrummed through it made his teeth vibrate. He found his companion after she waved to him from a table close to the far wall.
“Here you go.” He handed her a beer. “You are old enough, aren’t you?”
“Of course,” she said and took a slug of the drink.
“So this is less crowded than the other place?” He hoped that it didn’t sound mean but at the same time hoped it did.
“I guess I was wrong,” she said. “Probably because they have live music tonight.”
Ashe looked at the stage. A band’s equipment was set up, but the music filling up the place was recorded.
“Who is it, Casper and the Ghosts?”
Cybil shook her head while taking another drink. “It’s this local group called the Goth Sox. They play funky electronica punk semigoth stuff. They’re between sets right now.”
“Are they any good?” he asked.
“It’s according to your taste in music, but if you’re into Pat Boone, no they aren’t.”
He laughed. Pat Boone had never been to his taste. Back in the day he’d rocked out to Nirvana and Pearl Jam like most everyone else his age and a little bit older. An old photo or two might even have shown him in his flannel and ripped jeans phase, but he’d never understood the electronica rave music.
“I guess we’ll have to see.”
Finally he drank from his own beer. He hoped the alcohol would relax him just a bit. Tension still pulled at his insides. Cybil didn’t seem to notice or if she did, she was hiding it well. His pants began to vibrate. For a moment, he thought he’d given way to his slight amorousness, but quickly realized he’d put his cell phone there when they came into the bar. He fished it out and answered it. The noise in the bar was too loud for him to hear.
“Hold on a second,” he yelled into the phone. “I need to walk somewhere I can hear.”
Ashe walked from their table to the door. He stepped outside into the cool, damp air. His ears rang slightly from the reverb of the speakers inside.
“Are you still there?” he asked.
“Yes, this is Detective Semmes. Sounds like a raging party.”
“I came to the parade to try and get my mind off of things,” Ashe said. “Then I ended up at a bar.”
“Drinking doesn’t make things better. It makes them worse most of the time.”
“I promise I’m not trying to drink my blues away. It’s just a beer, and a cheap one at that. I’m sure you didn’t call to find out what I’m doing though.”
“You’re right. I like a man who gets straight to the point. I’m heading up to Birmingham tomorrow. I found out they’ve had a similar case at one of their hospitals.”
“What do you mean similar?”
“They had a dead woman get up and walk out of the morgue at St. Vincent’s Hospital. I thought you might want to ride up there with me.”
“Why would I want to do that? I’ve missed quite a few days of classes. I don’t think the university is going to let me just keep missing,” Ashe said.
“For one thing, it might help me because you might notice similarities between Marianne and this woman. Another is that the police up there might not be very welcoming to me, but probably would think twice if I broug
ht you,” Semmes said.
“You want to take me along for sympathy,” Ashe said. “I don’t think so.”
“Don’t hang up. I really need you to go for the first part. If there is any similarity between the two women, it could give us an MO or something.”
“What kind of similarities am I going to be able to see? I’m not a psychologist, Detective. Just because I built a machine for recording emotions, doesn’t mean I understand them.”
“That’s not what I mean.”
“So what do you mean?”
“I mean, physically.”
“You mean carnally. You’ve got stills from the morgue video at University Hospital.”
“Okay, you knew her carnally. I can’t explain it, Ashe; I just need you there. You saw the video of Marianne. You have a doctorate, so you give it more credibility than just me. Even though I’m a detective, they might still think I’m crazy.”
Harsh notes from a keyboard screeched from the bar’s open door. Ashe cringed as the notes assailed his ears. The Goth Sox must have taken the stage.
“All right, when are you leaving?” he asked.
“Around 6 a.m. I’ve got your address so I’ll pick you up at your house,” Semmes said.
“I’ll be ready.”
Without another word, Ashe hung up and slipped his phone back into his pocket. He walked back into the bar. Green and red lights flashed from off the stage. A skinny woman with green and pink striped hair clutched a microphone in both hands. She sang something that sounded a lot like nothing to Ashe. He tried to block out the noise as he made his way back to Cybil. When he got there, a college-aged guy with eyeliner around his eyes sat beside her. She looked up at Ashe and smiled.
“Dr. Shrove, this is Stewart, a friend of mine.”
Jealousy poked at Ashe as he stuck his hand out to shake with the guy. Stewart didn’t reciprocate.
“I don’t shake hands,” he said. “Germs.”
