Some Like It Shot

by Elise Sax

  I couldn’t answer because I was too focused on the competition. If anyone had ever told me before that I would be riveted by a taco-eating contest, I would’ve told them they were crazy. But here I was, completely riveted. Nothing could have turned my attention away from what I was witnessing. A giant clock by the contestants’ table spun slowly around as the minutes passed, heading towards ten minutes and the finish line.

  “I wish I had a bet on this. It would’ve made it more fun,” John said. “Look at me, gambling. I’d forgotten about gambling. It was one of the things I liked to do when I was alive.”

  The clock reached ten minutes, and another siren blasted. There was no question that Danny Avocado had won the taco-eating contest. He remained the champion. Music started to play through the loudspeakers, and Danny stood and raised his hands high above his head in his signature triumphant pose.

  In a split second, an arrow flew through the air and hit Danny right in the chest, as if it had a GPS right to Danny’s heart. Danny’s hands flew to his chest and clutched the arrow that had pierced his body.

  His eyes rolled back in his head and he gasped one last breath of air before he fell face down on the table, breaking the arrow in two.

  The music continued to play, but there was an eerie silence from all of the spectators and the contestants of the taco-eating contest. A few seconds later, a few women and one man screamed in terror, and then there was a stampede of people running away from the scene of the crime, in case another arrow was going to be launched at them.

  John turned toward me and shrugged. “Well, there’s something you don’t see every day.”

  Chapter 5

  “Evil is not something superhuman. It’s something less than human.”

  –Agatha Christie

  I couldn’t believe my eyes. I couldn’t believe what I had just seen. I had witnessed my first murder. I had seen several murdered people before, but never a person actually getting murdered.

  It was awful. I felt trauma drape over me like a quilt. I knew that it would worm its way into my system, and I didn’t know if it was possible to get rid of it. I still clung to the trauma of my mother’s murder, and she had died right after I was born.

  As everyone ran away from the area, John ran right toward the bandstand and Danny’s prostate body. I was right on John’s heels, running as fast as I could. I didn’t want him to investigate a murder on his own. I worried that his true identity would be discovered. And trauma aside, I also was driven by the now familiar feeling of curiosity and the drive to find out who murdered Danny and why.

  And boy, Danny Avocado sure was murdered.

  We climbed up onto the bandstand, and John looked out over the area, as if he was searching for the killer. I searched the area too, but I didn’t see anybody with a bow and arrow or anyone who looked any more suspicious than our normal townspeople usually looked.

  John lifted Danny’s body off of the table and back into a seated position on his chair. The broken arrow was lodged in Danny’s chest, and Danny wasn’t breathing at all.

  “It went right through his heart,” John said. “I’ve seen this kind of kill dozens of times, but not like this, and certainly not in the twenty-first century.”

  “Who would want him dead? Why would someone want to kill a competitive taco eater? And why with a bow and arrow? This is America. Everyone’s got a gun.”

  “In my previous life, I would know just what to do, but I have no idea what a modern-day detective is supposed to do in this sort of situation,” John said.

  A seagull squawked loudly and landed on the table. It began to eat the remaining tacos. A few seconds later, it was joined by a dozen other seagulls. John and I tried to shoo them away, but they weren’t scared of us. I guessed tacos were worth the threat of any human.

  “I think you’re supposed to tape off the area with police tape,” I told John. “I wish we had a television at home. I could’ve watched police shows. Then I would know what to do. I guess I need to read more mystery novels.”

  John touched my shoulder. “Police tape is a good idea, Aggie. I’ll do that. That’ll look real. Like I know what I’m doing.”

  We were joined by two police officers and the chief of police. It turned out that we didn’t have to worry about taping off the scene because the police officers did it for us.

  “Give me your report,” the police chief ordered John.

  “The victim had won the contest. He stood up, and he was shot by an arrow. There’s no sign of the killer, and I’ve seen no evidence anywhere of anyone with a bow and arrow,” John said, sounding just like Remington.

  I gave him a little elbow in his side and winked at him to congratulate him on his good impression of a real live detective.

  “Good,” the chief continued. “Well, you know what to do, Cumberbatch.”

  John nodded “Yes, sir. I know what to do. The police tape’s done. And then there’s other things that a twenty-first century detective would do.”

  John wiped some sweat off his forehead. Uh-oh. His impression had slipped, and he wasn’t sounding anything like a twenty-first-century detective. He was sounding like a ghost that had taken over a live person and was trying to pretend like he was him, but having no idea what to do.

  I began to sweat, again. These days I was either sweating because I was a four-hundred-year-old virgin who was in constant contact with a hot sexy man with the soul of a man I loved, and they both wanted to deflower me at the same time. Or I was sweating because I was worried that the town of Sea Breeze was going to discover that their resident witches were responsible for the possession of their detective and sexiest citizen.

  Either way, I was sweating.

  The seagulls squawked as they fought over the remains of the tacos. I swatted one aside, but it turned on me, going for my head with its talons. I swatted at it again, and it landed on a taco and started eating it.

  “That’s it!” Eddie Acid yelled from below. He had returned to the scene of the crime with a few of the others, once it seemed safe and unlikely that a second volley of arrows was ever going to happen.

  “We want your statement, Mr. Acid,” the chief of police called to him. “Isn’t that right, Detective?”

  I elbowed John in the side. “You, that’s you,” I whispered to him.

  “Yes, I need your statement,” John said, waving at Eddie. John smiled at me, like a kid who had pooped in the potty on his own for the first time. I broke out into another sweat.

  “I don’t give a good goddamn about your statements,” Eddie shouted. “I’m in crisis, here. First bullets. Now arrows. Arrows! I’m a punk rocker. I’m not John Wayne! And it’s all because I tried to help this hellhole of a town. Never again! Do you hear me?” he yelled at the group that was forming to find out what the ruckus was about. The other competitors had wandered back, all looking shell-shocked.

  Eddie stomped his foot on the ground. “From now on, I’m going to be an Ayn Rand fan! Screw the other man! Screw him!”

  The press returned and started to interview the competitors. They shoved their cameras in their faces and asked questions about arrows.

  “What’s the matter with you, Remington?” the chief asked John. “You need to get those witnesses before they spill to the press, and you need to get their statements. Police first; press never…if we can help it.”

  “On it, boss,” John said, and he wiped his forehead. We were both sweating.

  The seagull near me stopped eating the taco and eyed me. “Uh, Remington. I think we should move,” I said.

  The forensic guys climbed up to us, and I stepped aside so they could reach Danny’s body. As I moved, the seagull narrowed its eyes at me, and I froze in place. He was definitely focusing on me, and I could have sworn that he had bloodlust in him.

  “Remington,” I said, tugging his sleeve. “We need to move.”

  “Right away, Aggie,” he said, but it was too late. The seagull took flight and flew for my head. I swatted
at him, but he landed.

  His talons latched onto the top of my head, and I screamed. “Seagull! Bird! Head!” I yelled and lost my balance. I went over the side of the bandstand backward, taking the bird with me.

  The seagull flapped its wings, I guess because it was trying to stay airborne. I made a little wish to the universe that it would succeed. But its wings weren’t strong enough to make us both fly. And we were a team. His feet were tangled in my hair, and even though he was yanking, trying to get free, we were locked together.

  I landed on the ground with a thud, and the seagull fell on top of me, flapping one of its wings on my face.

  “There goes another one!” I heard Eddie yell. “This town is picking off folks left and right. Guns, cats, arrows, sharks, and now birds. I’m out of here. I’m going to buy an Ayn Rand book.”

  “Help,” I croaked. “Bird. Face. Help.”

  Amy was the first to reach me. She was still clutching a clipboard to her chest. “You’ve got a seagull stuck to your head,” she said, leaning over me. She had a stern expression on her face, as if I was responsible for ruining the taco-eating competition and her chances at marriage to one of the Chris’s.

  “It’s stuck in my hair,” I croaked. As if to prove my point, the seagull flapped wildly and cawed like I was holding it prisoner.

  Amy sucked her lower lip deep into her mouth, and her body shook.

  “Are you laughing at me?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “I’m trying really hard not to. Why don’t you get up? It’ll fly away if you get up.”

  “Sure. Why not? I’ll get up just as soon as I don’t have a bird attached to my head.”

  It was times like these that I wished I was back in my lighthouse. Not only because it wasn’t likely that a seagull would attack my head in a lighthouse. But, also because my special gifts would come in handy. I wasn’t exactly allowed to use them in the middle of town in front of celebrities and a contingent of the press.

  Amy tried to help me up, but the seagull started to peck at her and dug its claws into me even more. “Don’t panic the bird! Don’t panic the bird!” I yelled.

  Amy screamed and ran away. I struggled to my knees and crawled around the bandstand with the bird attached to my head.

  “Will someone help me?” I demanded. Boy, women’s lib sure had screwed things for damsels in distress.

  “My eye!” I heard, and one of the forensic guys fell off the bandstand behind me. My seagull flapped and complained loudly.

  “This isn’t happening,” I said.

  “It attacked me,” the forensic guy moaned. He lay on his back on the ground with his hands over his injured eye.

  John stuck his head around the bandstand. He had a long gash on his arm. “I don’t know what’s happening. It all went ass over elbow. It’s like something out of a horror movie.”

  “It’s Hitchcock,” the forensic guy said. “The Birds. It’s like a reboot of The Birds.”

  John helped me up and pried the seagull out of my hair. When it flew away, a shock of pain went through me like a knife.

  “Don’t worry,” John said, staring at my head.

  “What? What don’t I have to be worried about?”

  “You still look beautiful with a bald spot.”

  My hand flew to my head. There was a large patch of scalp where there used to be hair. “It ripped my hair out! I have a bald spot!”

  For the first time, I was tempted to eat some discount hot gummy worms from the dispensary.

  “You look perfect,” John said, but he didn’t look totally convinced. He smiled at me, but his eyes kept darting to my bald spot. He took my hand, and we walked around the bandstand.

  Back on the other side, it was bedlam. Even worse than when people were stampeding away because they were afraid of being shot with an arrow. The seagulls had ravaged the tacos and were now setting their sights on human flesh. There were beaks and wings everywhere, chasing down out of shape townspeople with bellies full of tacos, who were flailing their hands in the air in panic, which ironically gave the seagulls a better target.

  “Three people need to be hospitalized, but the paramedics are down for the count,” John explained, pointing at one paramedic fighting with a seagull and another paramedic running for his life.

  “I’m bald,” I said.

  “Not totally bald,” John said. “And I can’t see it if I look from your right. Wait a minute. Nope. I can see it from any angle. Maybe you can wear a hat. Women don’t really wear hats, anymore, though. Have you noticed that?”

  I could feel my blood pressure rise. I took a deep breath to calm myself. “I think you’re supposed to do something,” I said. “I mean, about the birds.”

  “I’m supposed to question all of the witnesses. Luckily, they’re all congregating in your soup shop.”

  I looked across the street. The press and the movie stars were rushing for cover into the shop.

  I sighed. “I hope they’re not hungry. I can’t make more soup today. It’s just not in me to simmer.”

  “I think the lady doth protest too much, my dearest Agatha. I think you like working in the shop.”

  “Take that back. I’m a lighthouse woman, not a soup woman.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Stop psychoanalyzing me. Psychology was born over three hundred years after you died.”

  John put his hands up in surrender. “Fine. I’ll back off. But I’ve learned a lot from Netflix about psychology.”

  “You’re supposed to be securing the crime scene.”

  “Are you kidding? We don’t have to worry about anyone contaminating the scene. The scene is good and contaminated. And nobody’s going to contaminate it further because they’re running for their lives from the killer birds. Not to mention that poor Danny Avocado is covered in bird crap.”

  He was right. Poor Danny Avocado had been dive-bombed by half of the Pacific’s sea birds. It was disrespectful, and I was more than tempted to clean him up in the Bright women’s way.

  “Your eyes are twinkling,” John said. “It totally took my attention away from your bald spot.”

  John and I stood outside the soup shop. “I’ve no idea how to do this,” John said, looking nervously at the door. “I was a prosecutor. I never asked questions.”

  I didn’t respond. His prosecutor years was a sore subject for me.

  “I’m good at questions. I’ll help you,” I offered.

  John squeezed my hand. “I need your help through all of this.”

  “Through what?”

  “The investigation. You’re experienced at solving mysteries and locking down killers. I need your guidance.”

  I studied his face to see if he was shining me on, but he was serious. “I have to read more mystery novels,” I told him. “I’m barely an amateur.”

  “I disagree. You’ve got a real talent.”

  We locked eyes, and I felt myself blush, this time from pride instead of desire. I wasn’t used to being complimented for something that I valued. The truth was that I couldn’t wait to get my hooks into finding out who killed Danny and why.

  “You sure you want me to help you?” I asked John. “Remington wouldn’t want me to help him. He would say something snarky about soup and minding my business.” And he would try to get in my pants, but I didn’t think I needed to let John know that.

  “Yes, I’m sure. Look how you helped right after the murder.”

  We turned around. The crime scene had been taped off and was calm. I had helped John check on Danny, but nothing more. After the forensic guys were treated for seagull injuries, they inspected what remained of the scene and carted Danny’s body to the morgue.

  After the seagulls scared everyone away, they regrouped on the beach and didn’t seem like they were intent on leaving.

  It was like the birds were waiting for more victims.

  John opened the door for me, and I walked inside.

  Chapter 6

  “It seemed l
ike a nice neighborhood to have bad habits in.”

  –Raymond Chandler

  “I was bald for two months once,” Auntie Tilly told me.

  My aunts and I were sitting at the kitchen table, eating cinnamon toast and drinking hot chocolate. Auntie Ida had put a pecan pie in the oven, and we were waiting to eat it for dessert. The table had been cleared of the ancient books, and the computer was still at Remington’s apartment.

  My aunts seemed more relaxed, but I didn’t think they had found a solution to the Remington/John problem. I assumed that they wanted to take a break with some brain food, and there was nothing like cinnamon toast to clear the mind and rejuvenate the spirits. I was on my eighth slice.

  “That wasn’t my fault, Tilly,” Auntie Ida said, clearly affronted.

  Auntie Tilly took a large sip of her hot chocolate. “It was your fire, Ida. You made that fire, and since it wasn’t an on the up-and-up kind of fire, my hair wouldn’t grow back.”

  “I’m sorry, Tilly,” Auntie Ida said, completely out of character for her. She never apologized to Auntie Tilly normally. “I was trying to invent never-ending fire.”

  “And never-ending fire causes never-ending baldness,” Auntie Tilly complained.

  “But your hair grew back,” I said. Auntie Tilly had long, thick gray hair, which she wore up in a thick, loose bun.

  “I waited two months and then had to go to the family back East. They took care of it,” Auntie Tilly explained.

  Auntie Ida threw Auntie Tilly a look that could kill, and Auntie Tilly clapped her mouth shut and picked up a slice of cinnamon toast.

  “What?” I asked. “What aren’t you telling me?”

  “Nothing,” Auntie Ida said. “You don’t need to know.”

  Uh-oh. I was pretty certain that anything they thought I didn’t need to know, I actually needed to know. But I didn’t have time to dig the information out of them. I was overwhelmed with things I needed to know.

  Danny Avocado was lying in the morgue with a broken arrow through his heart. John had to tell all of the witnesses to stay in town, which didn’t go down well with the celebrities. Even though the police thought that there was an unknown assailant with a bow and arrow wandering through Sea Breeze, they needed to hold on to the witnesses for a while longer in order to get more information.