Murder Feels Awful

by Bill Alive

  “I don’t even have one—” I started.

  Mark cut me off. “He’s cool, he’s here to observe.”

  “Did you check his phone?” said Ponytail Guy. “Is he running a stock OS?”

  “Oh, right.” Mark sighed. “Turn your phone off.”

  “That’s not enough, it can be activated remotely!” Ponytail Guy said. “Put it in your pack, at least! Why didn’t you tell me, Mark, I’d have brought silver wrap!”

  Zack rolled his eyes, but he didn’t countermand the order.

  “Um,” I said. “You mean like, you think my phone might be hacked and someone is spying on us?”

  “Might be?” said Ponytail Guy, incredulous. “Have you not seen the NSA reports from the Android Defense League?”

  “Oh, no worries then,” I said, pleased that I’d recognized the word ‘Android.’ “My phone’s Apple.”

  But his eyes bulged with shock. His forehead flamed dangerously red.

  “Just shut it off,” Mark said.

  “Watch it! Camera! Cover that phone!” cried Paranoid Ponytail, shielding his face as I pulled my phone out.

  “Let’s root it!” said the Kid.

  “Let’s actually get some hackery on,” said Zack. “Brzezinski, you’re on tonight. What you got?”

  Glasses Guy, or Glasses Brzezinksi, who apparently had totally gotten used to having such a kick-ass last name, licked his lips with excitement. “I found Haskell script for access all remote backups from command line as encrypted VM. Dropbox, Google Drive, Amazon buckets, everything.”

  Appreciative murmurs rippled all around. I tried to look excited, but the only part I’d understood was the word ‘buckets’, and I was pretty sure I’d gotten that wrong.

  The wall lit up with a projected image of his laptop screen. A black window was spewing white text that looked like gobbledygook.

  “Configuration, of course, is beast,” he continued. “Let’s go.”

  The next two hours felt like ten.

  I had expected this to be painful, but I’d been wrong … it was excruciating. It was like being trapped with a bunch of lawyers getting all excited about the exact phrasing of an insurance contract. Except at least the lawyers would be getting paid.

  And I couldn’t even use my phone.

  I’m serious, by the time it was done, I felt six months older. For the first time, I wondered if I’d be able to hack this detective thing.

  I kept waiting for Mark to steer the conversation around to finding the name of that doctor. But he actually seemed to be enjoying this.

  Finally, they seemed to be done. Laptops were snapping shut, even as they kept yammering about their super fascinating geek stuff. I gave Mark a pointed glance.

  He squirmed. Still nervous? Seriously?

  “Oh, hey,” he said. “Speaking of data mining, is there some tool for searching professional directories with, say, a first name and a location radius?”

  “Like which profession?” asked the Kid.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” Mark said casually. “Medical.”

  “Medical!” boomed Zack. “You want pics too? You looking to date some hot doctor?”

  “No, and I’m sure she’s not hot,” Mark said.

  “She could be hot,” I said.

  “She?” said Zack, and now we had everyone’s full attention. Mark winced. Zack kept booming. “You finally stepping out with the ladies, Mark? Papa Bear coming out of his cave? I noticed your new hairdo.”

  The geeks snickered.

  Mark flushed. He bored his blue glare straight at Zack’s face. “I’m investigating a murder,” he said quietly.

  All the geeks startled, but Zack’s surprise had a strange note of remembrance. He nearly blurted something, but Mark seemed to hold him silent.

  Had Mark just mind blasted the guy? Probably not, I decided, considering Mark’s major blood vessels all seemed intact. Mark’s glare could be potent enough … but what had Zack wanted to say?

  Glasses Brzezinski was the first to speak. “Investigation?” he said. “Is excellent.”

  “Oh?” Mark said.

  “Of course!” said Paranoid Ponytail. “The whole police-government complex is completely corrupt!”

  “Well—”

  “Is it the local murder? The glider crash?” chirped the Kid. “Sweet, that was a total setup. I ran a simulation, and even a newb would have had to try to crash in that weather.”

  Mark looked relieved at all this excitement. But he gave Zack a questioning glance.

  Zack eyed Mark back with solemn concentration. His large eyes went still, and his long face set in a grim question of his own. He and Mark seemed to forget the rest of us, sharing some ancient memory of failure and grief.

  Then, in a low voice like distant thunder, Zack said, “Count us in.”

  The others whooped, and the laptops snapped back open.

  “Give us all the details!” chirped the Kid. “I’ll set up news alerts to track all the suspects!”

  “I can make new IRC channel,” said Glasses Guy. “So we can chat on developments.”

  “Whoa, guys, you don’t need to—” Mark said.

  “We’ll expect hourly updates,” Zack said with a smile.

  “Crap,” Mark muttered.

  He told them what he could about the case so far, leaving out the bits about him being, you know, an empath. In this version, he’d merely “witnessed” the plane crash and just “felt suspicious” at the funeral.

  When he got to Gwen saying Lindsay had epilepsy, the Kid broke in.

  “The news didn’t say she was epileptic,” he said. “An epileptic would be seeing …” His fingers jabbed the keys. “… a neurologist. Did you not think to search on neurologists in Brown County? How many do you think there are?”

  “Crap,” Mark said.

  “Yeah, Brown Memorial only has one. Jivanta Kistna.” The Kid smirked with triumph.

  Mark blushed. All over his head. “The guy couldn’t get her name straight,” he grumbled. “I wouldn’t have found that searching on Jane … or Genevieve…”

  His geek friends exchanged glances in smug silence.

  “I wonder if Dr. Kistna went to the funeral,” I interrupted.

  “Not sure,” said the Kid, escaping back to his screen from the eye contact. “I’d have to get into her phone, see her location history.”

  “Whoa there, Ubuntu boy,” said Paranoid Ponytail. “Let’s keep this quasi-legal.”

  “My phone tracks everywhere I go?” I said.

  Everyone laughed. Really hard.

  Especially the Kid. He was wiping his eyes as he said, “Okay, fine, who do we check next? Immediate family? Sister is Sibyl Samson, looks like she just got married. Like a month ago. Interesting. She’s forty-seven, but her husband is Fidelio Samson, he’s only thirty-four.”

  “Fidelio Samson? That sounds familiar,” I said, trying to pretend I wasn’t trying to redeem myself. “Where have I heard that name?”

  “Couple bought a McMansion with a view up on Curfew Drive. Number is 8749—”

  “I’m never going to remember all this,” Mark said.

  “Really?” I said. “That was barely anything.”

  “Just email it,” Mark said.

  “Actually, my email’s kind of a disaster area,” I said. “Better text it. Or are any of you guys on Tribesy?”

  There was a cold silence.

  The Kid muttered, “If I wanted to whore out my phone, I’d at least charge for it.”

  “What is with you all?” I said. “Are we even living in the same universe?”

  “Multiverse,” corrected the Kid, automatically, like a blessing after a sneeze.

  “It’s the permissions,” Mark said soothingly. “The Tribesy app uses all the permissions.”

  “What the hell are permissions?” I snapped.

  The geeks rumbled with shock and dismay. Someone threw popcorn.

  Things might have gotten ugly, but Mark leaped up. “We�
��d better head out,” he said, shoving his laptop into his pack. “Thanks, guys. Email me everything you find. I’ll owe you one.”

  “You always do,” Zack said.

  The drive home was silent.

  I really wanted to ask about Zack, but it didn’t take an empath to guess that Mark would stonewall (at best). I felt excluded and maybe a teeny tiny bit jealous, but I tried to remind myself that he and Zack were probably old friends, and Mark and I had only officially been housemates for almost a week.

  Finally, I said, “Hey, I hope I didn’t mess anything up with your friends.”

  “They’ll be fine,” he said. “They love fresh meat.”

  I flinched, hard. It hadn’t occurred to me I might ever have to go back.

  Chapter 13

  I like to sleep in on Sunday mornings, even when all I did last night is stay up binge-watching Unwinnable State. I didn’t stumble out till nearly ten. I assumed Mark was still asleep, but I had just cracked my eggs into the pan when the front door opened and Mark walked in. From outside.

  “You’re all dressed up!” I said. He wore a button-down shirt, complete with the collar intact, and his corduroys looked less than five years old. “What, did you go to church or something?” I joked.

  He scowled, like I’d dissed his mom. “Sorry to offend your delicate sensibilities.”

  “Wait, what? Sorry, man, I didn’t mean … it’s cool, lots of people go to church who aren’t terrible. Ceci’s one of my best friends, and she’s like, totally Lutheran.”

  I scanned the chaos for some religious cue I’d missed. Propped on one corner of the mantle was a small print of a young St. Joseph holding a toddler Jesus. The toddler was crying, and his dark-bearded dad was rubbing his back.

  “Dude,” I said. “Are you Catholic?”

  “Forget it,” he said, and rooted in the fridge. Suddenly he yelled, “Damn it!” and slammed the door.

  I jumped, spattering egg. “What? What is it? Is the coffee out?”

  “The appointment!” he snapped. “We can’t just make an appointment with that doctor for free! It’s going to be like two hundred bucks!”

  “What are you talking about?” I said. “It’s just a co-pay, like fifteen bucks. Maybe twenty.”

  He stared at me in total astonishment.

  Then he said slowly, “Please tell me you’re still on your parents’ insurance.”

  “Uh, yeah,” I said.

  He sighed. “Of course you are.”

  To plan my fake appointment, we did searches like ”symptoms should I see a neurologist,” and we decided I’d pretend to have headaches that might be migraines. For a neurologist, that option was the least scary.

  We also read up on epilepsy. Man, I feel so bad for these people. They don’t even know what causes it. Sometimes it might be genetics or stress or physical trauma, but plenty of times … no clue.

  And seizures are messed up. They can range from “only” trancing out to thrashing so hard that when you come to, your bones are broken. Also, you can die. There’s no “standard” epileptic seizure.

  Some victims feel an “aura” before the seizure starts, but that’s not standard either.

  “Chills?” I said, reading the symptoms off my phone. “Didn’t you have that with Lindsay? I remember you were shivering. Another dude says it felt like an anxiety attack. And he got a metallic taste in his mouth?”

  “Yeah, that was weird,” Mark said.

  “You had that?” I said. “What about zig-zag lights in the sky?”

  “Didn’t have that,” Mark said. He frowned and muttered, “Maybe she did have a natural seizure.”

  I thought it might be tricky making an appointment with a neurologist without getting a referral. But when I called on Monday and told them my insurance plan, the bored receptionist perked up and slotted me in for the next day. Say what you want about my parents, but they can really pick a PPO.

  Vivian, as Most Amazing Boss Ever, was still totally cool with me popping out for sporadic detective duty, so Tuesday morning found Mark and I at the hospital, sitting in a waiting room that smelled like rubbing alcohol and cinnamon.

  “I don’t know why you think this doctor can’t be hot,” I said.

  Mark groaned. “This isn’t TV World,” he said. “Super attractive women are relatively rare, and an awful lot of people on this planet are over forty. We’re already defying the odds with Gwen.”

  I perked up. “You think Gwen’s hot?”

  Mark frowned. “I didn’t mean—”

  The doctor’s door to the Inner Sanctum opened, and out stepped an Indian goddess.

  Technically, she was a mortal in a white doctor coat.

  But I felt like I was rising into heaven.

  Okay, listen. Before you throw your e-reader or phone or whatever at the wall … I don’t think girls really get the effect that a gorgeous woman has on a man. It is a mind-altering experience. It’s like some Manchurian Candidate routine activates, and your entire consciousness of the universe narrows to this tiny laser-dot white-hot mission: MUST MAKE CONNECTION.

  Eye contact is a jolt. A smile is astonishing, I can live on a smile for a week. It’s like, WOW! I EXIST!! And a laugh? Ecstasy. But if she’s just like, meh, you’re not really real … death.

  I don’t think it works like this for girls.

  Yes, I have tried to read girl books a couple times, and I’ve gotten far enough to tell that, okay, they notice cute guys, and they might get initial flutters around the occasional hunk, but it’s not so visceral.

  Or maybe it’s crazy visceral once, and then those chicks have to read romances for the rest of their lives to try to hit that high. It’s not something that’s going to hit them in real life at least once a week. When they’re just, say, trying to use the express checkout. Or see a neurologist.

  For girls, as far as I can tell, the guy’s got to do stuff, listen to you or say something intelligent or make you laugh. Or be rich and powerful. Something. Only then can you unleash the power of confirmation bias and decide he’s also super handsome. Until then, he’s totally on probation.

  Somehow our male brains did not get the memo about probation. I feel like that was an oversight.

  I feel like it’s asking a lot to expect us to register details, like whether a prospective mate seems to be friendly or bitchy or smart or moronic or sweet or a murderer, when we’re flooded with more endorphins than we’d get from recreational drugs and all our remaining brainpower has been routed into MUST MAKE EYE CONTACT.

  Sidebar: this is why I don’t bother with recreational drugs. Or porn. I mean, I’m not going to say I’ve never indulged, (sorry, TMI?) but these days I give it a pass. The dudes I know who are deep into it seem like they stop noticing real girls. Which creeps me out.

  Anyway.

  I just thought I should try to explain the male perspective. So I don’t seem like a complete ass.

  “Mr. Villette?” said Dr. Kistna, in flawless British English with the slightest seductive Indian lilt. She smiled. I was astonished. “Please come with me.”

  I wanted to say, “To the ends of the earth.”

  Mark sighed. “I heard that,” he muttered.

  Dr. Kistna, or as I instantly called her in the privacy of my heart, Jivanta, swished down the hall to an examining room. Inside, she turned and gave Mark a startled and startling smile. “Are you his bodyguard?”

  Mark twinkled. “Moral support. He gets skittish.”

  I’d never heard this Mark voice before, this deep, melodious croon, oozing confidence and charm.

  And she half-winked back! What the hell? She couldn’t be more than twenty-six or so. He was so much older. And fricking bald!

  Mark flicked me a frown and looked hurt.

  Sometimes being friends with an empath sucks.

  But he shifted away from her, and the chemistry sparked out and she was all business.

  “Have a seat,” she said, with an elegant wave toward a grim pair of chai
rs beside the examination table. “We’ll start with your symptoms and family history, and then we can do your physical exam and blood work.”

  Exam? I thought, with sudden panic. Blood work?

  Also … that morning, I’d discovered a triad of zits lurking mid-back, bulging with pus, precisely where I couldn’t reach back to pop them. I imagined her involuntary flinch of disgust, her perfect nose unable to avoid a delicate wrinkle.

  Plus, on a tray on the far counter, a gigantic needle gleamed with bloodlust.

  “Actually—” I squeaked. I cleared my throat. “Actually, it’s really just been a couple headaches.”

  Mark, who had sat by the wall window, sighed and rubbed his eyebrows. I have since learned that this is his version of a face-palm. One of them.

  “Mr. Villette,” Jivanta said sternly. “Recurring headaches are nothing to play around with. They can indicate a serious neurological condition.”

  “That’s what I’ve been telling him,” Mark said. “Neurologists handle the tough stuff. Strokes, dementia, epilepsy — didn’t that lady who crashed the glider have an epileptic seizure? What was her name? Linda?”

  “Lindsay,” she said. She had gone stiff, her dark eyes wells of sorrow and regret. (Ugh, more describing. I am never going to get good at this.)

  “Oh man, were you her doctor?” Mark said, with warm sympathy. “I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine…”

  “Part of the job,” she said, with the tiniest catch in her voice.

  “You can’t feel responsible, Dr. Kistna,” he said firmly. “She was probably on so many medications, just one bad interaction—”

  “Her medication profile was fine,” she said sharply.

  “But she only had to miss one or two doses, right?” Mark persisted. “If she had a seizure in the air—”

  “Lindsay was religious about her meds,” she said.

  “I knew it!” I blurted. “It couldn’t have been a seizure!”

  Jivanta snapped me a withering glance, eyes narrowed, then wheeled back on Mark. “Why are you two so interested in Lindsay Mackenzie?” she demanded.

  Mark grinned, with totally unfair confidence. “You got us. We’re investigating her death.”

  “I already talked to the police,” she said, suspicious.