The Meter Maid Murders

by Andrew Delaplaine

  The camera pulled back to a three-shot to include Billy.

  Sara turned to Billy.

  “What have the police done to catch this killer, William?” she asked.

  “Absolutely nothing effective, Sara. They’ve increased patrols, interviewed thousands of people, but unless they’re keeping it a secret, they haven’t even got a suspect.”

  “Except that everyone’s a suspect,” Bob Blunt interrupted.

  “That’s the problem, Sara—” here Bricker thought Billy was treading on delicate ground, maybe even quicksand—“You know what people think of meter maids, not to get too personal.”

  “You don’t have to tell me, William. I know people hate meter maids. My mother Serena was a meter maid. I was against it when Samantha followed her into the PMS Force. Mother tried to get me to join them. I was the baby, you know?”—she smiled a sick smile scarier than a crocodile in heat trying to attract a mate in the Everglades—“but I refused. I knew there was something better for me, so I went to Journalism School at UM, got a job after graduation here at the XYZ affiliate and worked my way to New York.”

  “Were you close to Samantha and Serena?” asked Billy.

  “Oh, yes, William. We were very close. Even though they were meter maids, I did everything I could to support them.”

  Ha! thought Bricker. She didn’t do shit. He’d seen where they lived and how they lived. The whole interview tested Bricker’s nerves. It was all about the cops, how bad they were, and how great Sara Succubus was.

  Bricker pulled himself together, shaved, showered and dressed. Then he drove over to the station and got word that the hearse carrying Sammy’s pathetic remains (along with her mother’s) had been stopped by an angry mob on Dade Boulevard by the old Publix.

  Everybody poured out of the station and raced over to the scene. A SWAT team was forcing its way through the crowd of angry citizens pelting the hearse with produce from Publix. The managers were bringing out shopping carts filled with tomatoes, pineapples, all sorts of fruit and vegetables and giving it all away to ordinary citizens who were throwing everything they had at the hearse.

  All sorts of wild curses filled the air.

  “Down with meter maids!”

  “Why stop now? Kill ‘em all!”

  “Fuck the meter maids!”

  “Give the killer a Medal of Honor!”

  “Death to meter maids!”

  And so forth and so on.

  Bricker was shocked. He’d never seen such a breakdown among ordinary civilians. The whole scene reminded Bricker of a movie about the French Revolution when everybody ran amok and aristocrats’ heads rolled down the steps after the guillotine lopped them off. Only aristocrats weren’t dying here—it was meter maids.

  Billy and a satellite crew arrived from WHY-TV, anxious to broadcast images of the rioting crowd. Bricker made his way over.

  “What the fuck is going on here?” Billy yelled over the noise.

  “Somebody put the word out that the meter maid hearse was coming this way. The people ambushed it from the Publix parking lot.”

  “Can I quote you?” Billy asked, pushing a microphone in front of Bricker’s face.

  “Fuck, no!” Bricker pushed the microphone away.

  Grandmothers tossed rotten eggs at the hearse. Old men in wheelchairs spit at it and waved their canes in the air. Little kids threw bubble gum at the hearse. Mothers holding their crying babies kicked the cops who tried to get through to the beleaguered driver.

  Finally, a semblance of order was restored after Major Bunstable came careening into the crowd at the head of a backup SWAT team, urging on her frightened intern driver, whose face got redder and redder: so red Bricker thought her pimples would start popping like exploding tires. The major, standing at the roll bar between her and the driver, looking more like a general in a chariot than Matron of All the Meter Maids, lashed out at the roiling crowd with her riding crop in one hand and a can of Mace in the other, slapping down and spraying the crowd at will, as grand as Alexander must have looked when he pierced the center of the Persian line in his quest for the Persian Emperor Darius.

  By now the SWAT team made headway against the crowd and the driver was able to nudge the hearse forward into a protective cordon the police formed on every side of the vehicle.

  People shrank away as the line, with Major Bunstable at the head, inched forward to a stretch of open highway on Alton Road and a clear shot to the Causeway.

  7 – Copycat Killings Spread

  Over the next couple of weeks, tensions subsided; people let their guards down.

  But not Jake Bricker.

  He was tossing hoops with Billy after work one day when Billy mentioned it.

  “You know what next week is, don’t you?”

  “Yeah, the New Moon, asshole.... So what?”

  “Are you ready”—an almost imperceptible pause—“this time?”

  “Yes, dorky-dork, I’m ready—this time,” he sneered back at his best friend that he sometimes wanted to punch in the face.

  “You got Morriseau covered?”

  “I know her every move. I’m all over that bitch like a cheap suit.” (He’d always liked that expression, sometimes using it too much, he admitted.)

  But the very next day, a meter maid got murdered in Chicago’s Loop. A teenager in a souped-up Mustang ragtop ran her down like a helpless possum frozen in some headlights on an interstate highway. Kid kept going till the cops nabbed him up in Evanston.

  Three days later, two meter maids were killed in New York, both falling under the furious onslaught of an eighty-three year old man who beat them to death with his walking stick when he caught them giving him a ticket in a handicapped zone and they questioned the validity of his disabled permit. They never fought back. Apparently, most meter maids suffer from DTR Syndrome, or Drowned Turkey Rain Syndrome, and temporarily freeze the way turkeys do when they look up at the sky when it rains and accidentally drown.

  Day after that, a Washington, D.C., meter maid was killed writing a ticket in the Jefferson Memorial parking lot. Murdered by a violent tourist who’d bought a plaster of Paris bust of the third president in “Ye Olde Jeffersonian Gift Shoppe” and used it to bash in the meter maid’s ugly face when he confronted her in the parking lot placing the just-written ticket on his windshield.

  Copycat killings: the greatest fear of every cop who’s ever tracked a serial killer.

  Next day, the president of the United States, Peter Quince, greeted his French counterpart at a reception in the Rose Garden. After the two presidents exchanged formal statements and the event was opened to reporters’ questions, no one wanted to ask about the state of U.S.-Franco relations.

  Bricker saw the whole thing (in the company of his Ezra Brooks) at the Deuce.

  “Boobs, throw me the remote!”

  Bricker switched on the sound just as the president opened the floor to questions.

  “What is the federal government going to do about the meter maids, Mr. President?” barked one reporter.

  “We are very concerned about the meter maid situation in Miami, New York, Chicago, and now here in Washington,” President Quince intoned in a solemn voice. “We are determined to do everything in our power to put an end to this senseless violence.”

  “What is this doing to parking revenue in the United States?” asked a reporter from the Times.

  “As you all may know, parking revenue forms the most basic underpinning of all municipal income throughout the United States. Local municipalities don’t have the unlimited power to tax the way we do here in Washington. And most people wouldn’t stand for it if they did. But cities and towns and villages across the country have discovered that millions of dollars, indeed, billions of dollars, can be raised right under citizens’ noses in the innocuous form of parking tickets. One ticket at a time. This may not sound like a significant amount of money, but let me tell you, a few billion tickets add up to a hefty chunk of change.” The president allow
ed himself a subdued chuckle. “And we here at the federal level are going to do everything we can to see that these murders do not chip away at that invaluable source of income.”

  “What do you think would happen if parking revenue ceased to exist in this country, Mr. President?” asked the senior reporter from NBC News. “Hypothetically speaking.”

  “I can assure you we are speaking hypothetically, because if we had to do without parking revenue in this country, the very bedrock of our collective financial security, we might as well move into caves and live like the savages and backward people we’re fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan and Pakistan. We would return to the Dark Ages. American life as we know it would wither and die.”

  Bricker was thunderstruck. He hadn’t thought it was that bad.

  “Hey, Boobs! Gimme another drink.”

  Boobs brought the drink over and prepared to go through her usual one-two routine dropping the ice cubes into the glass.

  “Let’s skip the floor show this time, okay, Boobs?”

  Boobs frowned and dropped the ice cubes in one motion. She glanced up at the screen.

  “Think it’s as serious as the president says?” she mumbled.

  “It’s looks pretty bad, Boobs, pretty bad.”

  He drank quickly and headed out into the bright sunshine, convinced now more than ever of the gravity of the challenge confronting him. This wasn’t just about a devious serial killer stalking mentally impaired meter maids. It was about the very financial foundation of the country! President Quince had just said so. And if there was one thing Bricker was sure of, it was that presidents don’t lie.

  It was only noon. Bricker jumped into his car and ran down to have lunch with Billy at Monte Trainer’s overlooking the Alton Road Marina at Third Street. It was the only place on South Beach where the oysters were relatively cheap. Bricker and Billy, both being Florida boys, loved oysters and all kinds of shellfish.

  Billy was already at the bar, and Bricker could tell by his hushed demeanor that something was on his mind.

  Bricker slid onto a bar stool and ordered a Becks on draft.

  “New Moon starts tomorrow night, Billy-Boy.”

  “Don’t call me that. I know the New Moon starts tomorrow. I’ve got the fuckin’ date circled on a calendar, okay?”

  “Don’t get so testy.”

  “Testy?”

  The bartender came over with Bricker’s beer.

  “What kind of oysters you got?”

  “Malpeques and Bluepoints.”

  “Let’s have four dozen oysters, bartender, two dozen each of the Malpeques and Bluepoints. Extra horseradish, extra lemon,” Bricker said.

  “Yup,” nodded the bartender.

  “And bring this guy another beer.”

  “Miller draft. Yup,” said the bartender, moving away.

  “Get a grip, Billy. You gotta get a-hold of yourself.”

  “I been watchin’ the president, you know?”

  “I know, I know, I saw it all. I was watchin’ him at the Deuce.”

  “Well, it seems like maybe we had our chance, we blew it, and the right thing to do—”

  “What’s the right thing to do?” Bricker interrupted, an edge to his voice, scanning the room to make sure nobody could hear them.

  “I’m thinking the best thing to do at this stage is to take that tape I showed you and go to my boss at the station, and take it to your chief at the same time.”

  “You’re outta your fuckin’ mind, Billy.”

  “What do you mean? Jake, we got a national emergency on our hands. The country might fall apart if we fail to act.”

  Bricker took a long draw from his glass.

  “We are not failing to act, Billy. We are acting.”

  “But—”

  “I feel sorry for you, Billy. I thought I was selfish, greedy and ambitious. But you really take the cake. All you really want is to break the story. That’s all you want.”

  Bricker shook his head in dismay.

  “Jake, I want to catch the killer so we can stop the killing. That’s what I want!”

  “Lower your voice, asshole.”

  “I should just go to my boss and show him the tape and break the story wide open. The killing has got to stop.”

  A food runner brought the oysters, taking two trips. Bricker waited till he left.

  “You can’t go to your boss,” he said firmly, quietly.

  “And why the fuck not?”

  “’Cause you’re an accessory to murder after the fact,” Bricker said casually as he squirted lemon all over his plump Malpeques and Bluepoints, accidentally squirting some lemon juice into Billy’s eye.

  “What?”

  “The Malpeques look better than the Bluepoints,” Bricker said, slurping one. “Nice and briny.”

  “Fuck the oysters and let’s get back to me being an accessory to murder,” Billy whispered.

  “After the fact.”

  “Whatever.”

  “Just gimme this one last chance, Billy. Then we’ll go to the chief. I still think this is the best way to catch the fucker. But if you want a highly publicized manhunt that I think’ll drive the killer underground, we’ll do it your way.”

  Billy let out a huge sigh.

  “All right, all right. See if you can catch him before he kills Modest. After that, I say we go to your chief and my boss.”

  “What if we just go to the chief and not your boss?” Bricker slurped a Bluepoint. “Wow! Fuckin’ horseradish is hot!”

  “You’re thinking the chief’ll have some ideas about using the next meter maid—use her as a trap to catch him.”

  “Kinda what we’re doin’ now,” Bricker pointed out.

  “Yeah, but you’re not getting anywhere.”

  Bricker stopped swallowing oysters long enough to give Billy-Boy a sidelong glance.

  “Hey, slow down, buddy. I only lost Miss May. I’m working Miss June. At least give me a chance.”

  “Well...” Billy mumbled.

  Bricker could tell Billy was softening, would follow his lead.

  “Let’s just get through Miss June and we’ll re-examine the situation, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Now eat those oysters before they get too warm.”

  “They’re on ice.”

  “Just where we’re gonna put this fuckin’ killer,” said Bricker with a cocky smirk.

  8 – Murder in the Alley

  A few days into the New Moon in July, Modest Morriseau drew a schedule that included two nights, much to the dread of Jake Bricker. This would mean especially sleepless nights as he followed the bitch on her rounds in near total darkness. And it was that time of year when at night the temperature wasn’t but three or four degrees “cooler” than it was in the daytime. And the humidity was murder. So Bricker kept the a/c blasting away in his unmarked Crown Vicky day and night.

  Moddy Morriseau’s assigned section was the quadrant bordered by Washington Avenue on the west, Ocean Drive on the east, Twelfth Street on the south and Twenty-first Street on the north.

  The only good thing about this is the Deuce is smack dab in the middle of her territory, he thought.

  Still, he didn’t think he’d be slipping into the Deuce for the odd cocktail. Not at night.

  There’d been a lull in the national pattern of copycat killings, but still there was another one in Washington and a few days later one in Buffalo. Jesus, imagine being a meter maid and living in Buffalo. Two strikes right there, thought Bricker.

  As the summer deepened, murder analysts expected the killings to increase. Apparently, in summer, people let their anger and rage get out of control, and when they vent, they need to have something or someone to whom they can direct this pent-up fury. Meter maids are the perfect object of scorn, ridicule and hate. Tailor-made for murder in the summer months.

  The days flowed by, uneventful. Bricker was exhausted, taking pills and drinking Red Bull to stay awake. Even when Moddy went home to her tiny s
hack in Little Haiti, Bricker followed her, parked the whole time right across the street, or slowly cruised the streets immediately surrounding her house, always on the lookout.

  But the night it happened, the streets were slick and wet, with rain falling all day long and into the night. Most of the day it merely drizzled, but then there’d come these mother of all downpours, heavy rains and winds whipping through the palm trees, thunder cracking in violent spasms of light and energy. Very good weather to be in bed fucking Alice, he thought more than once. Twice he’d had to pull over when he couldn’t see through the windshield, his wipers slapping away furiously, to no avail.

  Moddy would pull over, too, but the minute it let up, off she putt-putt-putted down the road, keeping to her assigned territory, rain or not.

  There was no question the meter maid murderer was v-e-r-y clever. Bricker trailed Moddy and was following her down Thirteenth Street. She turned into the alley between Thirteenth and Fourteenth streets, directly behind the Deuce. As Moddy entered the alley, zipping past a Bob’s Barricade, Bricker was half a block behind her. He had to stop, get out of his car, cursing the heat, to move the barricade. She was putt-putt-putting down the alley, and when she was exactly halfway, just as Bricker was back in his car and entering the alley, it suddenly erupted into a wall of flame fifteen feet high.

  Bricker was just lucky enough to back his car out of the alley before the flames consumed him as well. But as he hit the accelerator in reverse, he heard the tormented wail of a dying Modest Morriseau rise in an anguished scream as it pierced the night.

  As the flames quickly died out and marked cruisers began to arrive with fire units not far behind, Bricker reviewed the carnage.

  He’d thought Modest was black before, but now she was really black, burned to a cinder. Bricker was running out of words to describe this meter maid murderer. He was a grisly killer, bone-chilling, gruesome, blood everywhere, like you wouldn’t see anywhere but a slaughterhouse.