by Gregg Bell
He walked up the stairs to his apartment. Half way up he heard the building entrance door open and close behind him. He always dreaded running into neighbors because of all the noise he made and never knowing what he might’ve done when he was drunk—blasting the stereo and what have you. He hurried his step.
“Dennis!”
A man’s voice but he didn’t recognize it. He kept going.
“Dennis, hang on!”
Denny stopped dead in his tracks. Detective Washington. Denny leaned over the railing and caught sight of the detective’s shiny bald head bobbing as he hustled up the stairs.
“I’m glad I caught you.”
Denny smiled. Nervously. “What’s up?”
“You get my voicemail?”
“Yeah, yeah, I got it but—”
“We’re right there, Dennis. You just need to fill in a couple of details and we’ve got this guy.” The detective nodded.
Oh crap. Denny thought of what Aunt Elizabeth had said. But on the other hand if he just answered a few questions it might end this whole ordeal. And he really did want to get the killer. “Yeah, well—”
“Great.”
The cop wasn’t letting him finish. Denny breathed in deep. “You see, I’m not supposed to...”
The detective held up two fingers and smiled. “Two questions. That’s it. That may be all we need from you to get this guy.”
Two questions. But even so, he couldn’t do it. The guy was pushing him. He started shaking his head. “I...I can’t—.”
“Two questions.” Washington shrugged. “Just tell me—”
“I talked to a lawyer, see, and she told me it was nothing personal but not to answer any more questions unless she was there.”
The cop said nothing for the longest time. He just eyed Denny like he’d never been so disappointed in his entire life. “You’re invoking your right to have an attorney present during questioning?”
Denny swallowed. “Yeah, I guess I am.”
“Well, I’m devastated because we’re so close to getting this guy but I have to respect that.” Washington bit his lip. “But then I’m also going to have to ask you to come down to the station with me.”
“What? Do I have to?”
“Well, yes you do. Dennis, a murder has been committed. We need to gather any information that can help us catch the killer before he kills again.”
“Okay, what happens if I talk to you right here? Like you said ‘two questions’?”
“We can do that too but it’s up to you. If you invoke your right to have an attorney present during questioning, I have a legal obligation to respect that. Likewise, if you choose not to have an attorney present that’s your choice as well.”
“Two questions?”
“I can’t guarantee anything, Dennis.”
Denny drew in a long breath and then shook his head. “Yeah, my aunt—she’s the attorney—she said I gotta have her there. It’s not up to me.”
* * *
So, having invoked his right to have an attorney present during questioning, Denny had to go to the Grand Central police station with Detective Washington. There he called Aunt Elizabeth but she must’ve been at a real estate closing because he had to leave a message. The room they put him in was different this time. Just ten by ten feet, windowless, gray-painted cinder block walls, a single electrical outlet. A small table and three chairs. No place to be if you were claustrophobic. So he sat there. And thought.
What did it all mean? How did invoking his right to a lawyer change things? Maybe he should’ve answered Washington’s two questions and been done with it. As it was he appeared guilty, like he had something to hide. Would they treat him as a suspect now? Were they already? Had they been all along? It certainly felt very different from the last time he’d been there. This was going to stress out Aunt Elizabeth too with her end of the month real estate busyness. He took his parka off and slipped it over the back of his chair. Still—he checked himself—he had to make sure the scratches weren’t visible. The door opened.
Aunt Elizabeth, with Detective Washington, a laptop under his arm, right behind her.
“Hello, Dennis,” Aunt Elizabeth said, all business-like, unfurling an orange scarf from around her neck.
Denny stood. “Thank you for coming.”
“Dennis,” Washington said with a nod.
It was all so formal this time. Washington set up the laptop on one side of the table, Aunt Elizabeth and Denny, elbow to elbow, in the chairs across from him.
Washington started with the same rigmarole. He explained the purpose of the interview. He asked Denny’s name, address, yada yada yada. It was clear the ‘two questions’ offer Washington had made back at Denny’s apartment had been a ruse and that Washington was no bud now. Denny’s heart raced.
Aunt Elizabeth, although certainly massively inconvenienced, was composure personified, listening acutely.
The questions were easy, moving along. Then Washington asked:
“Have you ever been angry enough to kill Rashida?”
“Have I ever—” Denny began to repeat the question but Aunt Elizabeth touched his forearm.
“Don’t answer that, Dennis.”
“But—”
She shot him a look. “Don’t answer.”
Washington went on and on through a litany of questions, many similar to ones he’d already asked but worded slightly differently, Denny wondering if he was trying to trip him up. But the questions turned relatively harmless again until he got to:
“You said earlier you were violent with Rashida. How often was that?”
Another pat on the forearm from Aunt Elizabeth. “No.”
Denny’s heart raced even faster now. Yes, it was comforting having Aunt Elizabeth there, but how was not answering these questions making him look? He had nothing to hide. “I can tell him.”
“No.” She glared at him.
Washington asked another question, and Aunt Elizabeth said curtly, “You already asked that.”
Washington frowned. Denny frowned too. ‘Two questions.’ About finding the real killer. Denny had expected to be asked about other people, maybe shown mug shots. Now he was expecting to be handcuffed and arrested. God, he needed a drink. If he didn’t get one soon, his head was going to explode.
“With all due respect, Detective,” Aunt Elizabeth said, “you’re essentially asking the same questions over and over.”
“Okay.” Washington looked long and hard at Denny. “All right.” His voice was utterly emotionless. “Dennis, thank you for taking part in this interview. We are in the process of interviewing others and waiting to get results back on forensic testing from the crime scene. It may be necessary to talk to you again. If it is, would you be willing to come back in?”
Denny looked to Aunt Elizabeth.
“Of course he would.” She stood.
* * *
“So what does it all mean, Aunt Elizabeth?” Denny asked as his aunt drove him home from the police station, dusk falling, the dark gray sky seeming to close in on them.
“Well,” said Aunt Elizabeth, remaining in all-business mode, “it means they still consider you only a person of interest.”
“And what does that mean?”
“It means they still want to talk to you, but they’re stopping short of accusing you of a crime and arresting you.”
“But they might be arresting me?”
Aunt Elizabeth turned on the defroster as their breaths were starting to fog the windows. “Yes. In some ways being a person of interest is good. It means they don’t have enough evidence or probable cause to arrest you. But in some ways it can be bad, because you may be their prime suspect and they don’t want you to know.”
Denny fell back in his seat and exhaled deeply. “Washington tried to trick me at my apartment, saying he only had two questions for me.”
“That’s what they do, Dennis. They make it seem all easy and light-hearted. Then next thing you know you’ve said th
ings that incriminate you.”
He took in a long breath and sighed it out. “Unbelievable.”
“That’s the reality of it.”
“So I mean, are they going to be watching me now, tailing me?”
Aunt Elizabeth shrugged. “Difficult to say.” The defroster was running hard. “Dennis?”
He looked at her. Her face seemed troubled.
“You know I love you, but is there anything you’re not telling me?”
That sounded like an outright accusation. She might as well have said, like Washington: ‘Did you kill Rashida?’
“You think I killed my wife?”
“She was your ex-wife, Dennis.”
“Yeah, I know that, but you think I killed her?”
“Don’t raise your voice to me.”
He slouched in his seat.
“And no, I don’t think you killed her, but I have a feeling you haven’t told me everything either.”
He thought of the scratches, the bump on the back of his head. But telling her about them would be embarrassing as hell. He closed his eyes. That he was so drunk he couldn’t remember how he’d gotten them was beyond pathetic. But so was rotting in Cook County Jail with gangbangers and murderers and rapists. He opened his eyes. “The night Rashida was killed I got a welt on the back of my head and scratches on my arms and neck.”
“How?”
He swallowed hard. The only sound the defroster, which seemed to grow louder.
“How, Dennis?”
“I don’t know.”
“Let me see the scratches.”
He sighed, unbuckled his seat belt, hunched forward and struggled out of his parka. He rolled up his sleeves and unbuttoned his shirt collar.
Aunt Elizabeth shook her head and her face went pale.
* * *
Denny was going to get plastered. Aunt Elizabeth dropped him off in front of his apartment building. He ran up the stairs, hurried to the kitchen and opened the fridge. Damn it, that was right—he’d poured what was left of his beers down the drain. He cursed himself for doing that and ran back down the stairs. A liquor store was only a couple of blocks away. Screw it, rather than getting the snow off his car and warming it up, he’d walk.
Insanity. Insanity was on the loose. This whole mess had come from out of nowhere. Not long ago he’d had not a care in the world, and now it seemed the cops thought he killed his wife, well, his ex-wife. A squad car crossed the railroad tracks and Denny figured it was on its way to arrest him. What did people get for murder? He didn’t even know if Illinois had the death penalty. Why would he?! He was no murderer! He sloshed through the snow of an unplowed parking lot, the snow getting into his shoes, soaking his socks—he didn’t care.
He knew a shortcut and headed down an alley. Oh God, what was this? A guy sat with his back to a dumpster, a long-ashed cigarette in his mouth, a bottle of wine in his hand. No coat. No gloves. No shoes. Just sitting there in the snow in a torn purple sweater and dirty blue jeans.
The guy was obviously a hopeless drunk. Denny looked away and waited for the guy to panhandle him as he went by but there was nothing. He hurried along, resolving to return the long way to avoid him. He turned a corner around a building, and the bright yellow sign of the liquor store beckoned down the block. Oh, it promised sweet relief! Relief was coming! He walked on a shoveled sidewalk now. The only question remaining was what brand of beer to buy and he’d buy a half pint of whiskey to jump-start the process.
But the memory of the guy in the alley was bugging him. The guy was going to freeze to death if he stayed there all night. “But hell,” he said aloud. “His crisis is not my crisis.” Yeah, he told himself. It was all about taking care of himself. It was all about him.
But the guy had no shoes. “Oh, damn it to hell!” Denny spun on his heel and headed back to the alley.
He was just going to check on the guy, maybe give him ten bucks, and that was it—then head right back to the liquor store. He turned into the alley. The guy was still there, practically catatonic, a zombie, leaning on the dumpster. His cigarette had burned to the filter and gone out but the guy hadn’t noticed. The bottle now lay by his side. The guy was in his forties maybe, or maybe thirties, but years of boozing made him look older. Black hair, a receding hair-line, with a touch of gray in it, the start of a scruffy salt and pepper beard.
“What happened to you?” Denny called to him.
The guy looked up but said nothing.
“What happened to your coat? Your shoes?”
The guy scratched his cheek. “They dumped me.”
“Who, who dumped you?”
“Out of the car.”
“What happened, somebody pushed you out of a car?”
The guy nodded.
“But what happened to your shoes?”
The guy shrugged.
Denny exhaled deeply. He plucked the spent butt from the guy’s lips, put his hands under his armpits and hefted him up against the dumpster. “Come on. You can’t sit here in the snow. You’ll freeze to death.”
“They dumped me.”
“Yeah, yeah, they dumped you. Now I’m going to lift you onto this dumpster. And you just stay here until I come back, okay?”
The man nodded.
Denny bent low and with a surge slid the man up and planted him on the dumpster. “Stay here,” he said, wagging a finger in the man’s face.
Oh, he thought as he walked off. This was the last thing he needed to be doing. But the guy was down on his luck and Denny certainly knew what that felt like. He hurried home, grabbed the extra winter coat he used for snow shoveling, gloves and some warm boots, got in his car and drove back to the alley.
Well, at least the guy was still sitting on the dumpster. It was getting dark though and Denny could see the man’s head was slumped on his shoulders. Maybe he was sleeping? Maybe he was dead? Denny pulled up next to him, grabbed the boots and got out of the car. “Hey, remember me?” he said loudly, walking over. Good, the guy wasn’t dead. “I brought you something.” He stuck the boots on his feet. “There. Perfect fit.”
The man raised his feet and clunked the boots lightly together. Denny returned to the car for the coat. “And one more thing. I think this ought to fit you.” He slid the coat over the man’s shoulders, wiggled his arms in, zipped him up and slipped on the gloves. “There.” He pulled the hood over his head. “That’s better.”
Denny glanced down the alley toward the liquor store. “So you think you’ll be all right now?” He pulled the hood off the man’s head to see his eyes better. “I mean, you’ll be okay on your own?” Denny nodded.
“Got a cigarette?”
Oh God. The guy was still a zombie. He’d barely muttered the words. Denny pulled out his cigarettes, put one in the man’s mouth and lit it for him.
The man took a deep drag. “Thanks,” he mumbled.
“Yeah, okay, but listen, man, I gotta run. You got someplace to go?”
The man shook his head.
“Any friends you can call? Anything?”
The man took another drag on the cigarette and looked off vacantly.
“Oh God.” Denny took a step back and stared at the guy. He frowned. He sighed. Finally, he said, “You want to get warm somewhere?”
The man hardly seemed to hear the question.
“Can you walk?”
Again no response.
“Oh, what the hell.” Denny snatched the cigarette from the man’s mouth and lifted him off the dumpster. “Come on.” He walked him to his Camaro, opened the door and deposited him in the passenger seat.
He drove the guy to the Serenity Club. He practically had to carry him up the stairs. When they entered the club a few old-timers sitting around drinking coffee immediately summed up the situation and came over to welcome the guy. They got the guy coffee and got him settled at a table.
Denny hung around long enough to hear that the old-timers were going to get the guy to a shelter for the night, so he felt fr
ee to go. He looked at the guy one last time and then headed for the door, but before he got there an old-timer took a hold of his elbow. He looked Denny in the eye and said:
“God’s going to bless you for this, son.”
* * *
When Denny hit the outside air on his way out of the Serenity Club he felt different. He didn’t know how, or no, he did—he no longer felt like he had to get drunk. “This is weird,” he said softly to himself as he walked to his car. The shift in his mind-set threw him. But it was true. The compulsion to drink was gone. At least for the moment. Denny breathed in deep and exhaled as he started his car. The dash clock said 9:47. Now what was he going to do for the rest of the night? He thought and thought, letting the car’s powerful engine idle. What had Aunt Elizabeth said? That’s right—establish a timeline. In other words, find out what the hell happened the night Rashida was killed. Which realistically meant only one thing. Or more appropriately one person. Brig.
Nothing was etched in stone but again chances were Brig would be at The Wild Bull so Denny drove there. Sure enough, Brig’s monster Jeep, sitting high, huge, oversized knobby tires, was out front. Now how was Denny going to swing going in to talk to him and not drink again? But it was amazing. He still had the peace from dropping the guy off at the Serenity Club, the compulsion gone. Had the old-timer at the club been right? Was God blessing him?
The Wild Bull was buzzing. It was such a guy bar. ESPN, Comedy Central and Ultimate Fighting were on the TVs. Denny was amazed the waitresses lasted as long as they did, with the drunken firemen groping them all the time.
Brig was sitting at one of the tables with that Rufus Tucker again. Denny tried to remember what Orson had said about Tucker. He was some sort of white supremacist or militia man. Denny shook his head. Brig somehow managed to find the lowest of low-life companions. Then Denny thought that he’d been friends with Brig for years.
Yes, they were friends but Brig certainly wouldn’t be feeling particularly friendly toward him after he’d tossed Denny out of his apartment after Denny woke him this morning. To Denny it seemed like that had happened days ago—so much had gone down since. Anyway, this Rufus Tucker was certainly a major bigot, in his camouflage cap and flannel shirt, his conversation seemingly only meant for Brig but realistically for anyone within earshot. He kept spewing his hateful philosophy. How Muslims should not only be stopped from entering the country but how the ones here ought to be kicked out. And Denny knew that with the way Brig already felt about Muslims, he didn’t need to be hearing any of this.
