After talking to the detective, I got ready for bed and call my mother, who sure as hell was ready to talk to me. She was a naturally involved woman who enjoyed being part of my business. I’d come to sort of accepting it. But I still loathe that about her.
Before I could call her, my phone vibrated, signalling that a call was coming in. Without checking who was calling me; I picked it up and answered the call; I regretted it immediately. I vowed to always check who was calling before I answered.
“OMG! Angie! I just saw!” Lauren exclaimed everything. I held in a groan. I should have checked.
“What?” I asked. She was the one usually sounding bored, but today, I was playing the role. And I thought I was doing well, but that could be because I was covering up my annoyance with boredom.
“Oh! The news about the body.” She said, sounding offended I was so slow to catch on. “Did you recognise her immediately? They put out there that it was Celine Ramroth. The Celine Ramroth.”
“They did?” I doubted it was a decision law enforcement had all agreed upon. Such a decision meant way too much media attention from other cities and countries too.
“Yes!” She now sounded exasperated. “I wonder what she was wearing.” She clicked her tongue in a thoughtful way, like that was an important detail she should have known. “Anyway, why didn’t you call me immediately about this, Angela? Like, aren’t I your best friend or something?”
Wait, what? I wanted to laugh. This was hilarious. Was she out there thinking she was my best friend? My best friend was my mother. That thought alone had my face flushing. So… I was weird and had no friends. When I realised Lauren was still waiting for an answer, I said;
“Oh. It’s because… I didn’t have the time. And I don’t know much about it at all..” I don’t think I sounded convincing enough.
“Whatever.” She said, annoyed. “Don’t tell me you haven’t been doing a little sleuthing of your own. Like, don’t you want to find out what happened to her?”
“I know what happened to her. She was strangled to death.”
“I mean, don’t you wanna know who did it to her? I thought that was the whole point of a murder?”
“The whole point of a murder investigation, Lauren. I’m sure this killer doesn’t want to be found, so it isn’t the point of the murder.”
“Okay, okay. Don’t come for me. I only thought…”
“Yeah. It was great talking to you, Lauren. I gotta go. I’ll call you after?” That was my pleasant way of telling her I didn’t want to talk to her anymore and wouldn’t be calling her at all after.
After I hung up on Lauren, I went back to the kitchen and made myself a cup of tea. I knew I wouldn’t be going to sleep soon. The case gnawed on my mind the whole time I was making tea and would continue gnawing at me throughout the night.
When I’d told her they arrested Philip, her face had fallen. She’d looked saddened and depressed for him, almost sorry for him. But her eyes held no emotion. She had a blank face once you looked past her facade; from this reaction, I knew I had a lead. I knew who to look into. Tanya was a liar. A terrible one at that, but still a convincing liar if you looked at her as a victim of bullies in town. This line of thinking brought me back to the piece of paper I’d found in her bathroom.
I’d changed out of my clothes by now so I made my tea and took it to my room where it rummaged through my pockets until I found it. It was in pretty terrible shape and crumpled up, luckily not torn. I opened it and smoothed it out. The message it contained left me confused. It wasn’t a straightforward note, not enough to incriminate anyone… yet.
Picking up my phone, I dialled the detective’s number; he would have been asleep if he were a normal person;
“Angela.” He said. “Another thought you’ve had?” At least he didn’t sound like he’d been asleep; a teeny-weeny bit annoyed with me, but I could take that.
“Well, yes. So today, I did a little snooping in Tanya’s bathroom.” I realised how idiotic that sounded as soon out loud. Lucas gave a low chuckle that did nothing in the form of boosting my ego and confidence; sprained it. “I don’t know what I was looking for in her bathroom, but I had to, you see?”
“No, I see nothing.”
“Yeah, whatever. Point is, while I was doing this; I found this piece of paper in her bathroom. It’s a note. Do you wanna hear it?”
“No, I want to hear it.” His sarcasm made my head spin. The exhaustion was finally kicking in, and I could feel it. “Is it typed or handwritten?”
“Handwritten.”
“Well, that’s good. I can ask someone to compare the handwriting or something.” He let out a shaky breath. “Did you touch it?”
“Of course, I didn’t. I mean, how else would I have picked it up, pocketed it, and been reading it?”
“Angela.” Something I’d said irritated him. What could it be? “That means you ruined evidence.”
“I’m not sure I follow,” I said. I didn’t get it at all. I had destroyed no evidence, the paper was still intact and I, I had found it. And he had the audacity to blame me for what? “Destroying what evidence exactly?”
“There could have been fingerprints on it, and now yours are on it too.” He intoned as if trying to explain geometry to a three-year-old. Which he must have felt like he was doing because I still didn’t follow him at all. I could be intelligent, then again, I could be an utter disappointment mentally.
“And? Do the fingerprint thing and then ignore my fingerprints…” I said. That sounded smart to me. If the problem was that my fingerprints were on the piece of paper, then he could do subtraction and ignore them.
“Yeah. It may sound simple, but it isn’t. Your touching the note would have destroyed some fingerprints. Which means the best we can do now could be a bunch of partial fingerprints… and yours.”
Then I realized, so this was a big deal. I could almost see how big the mess I’d made was. I had made a bigger mess of this than I’d intended. “I’m sorry, Lucas, I didn’t know.”
“And besides, how will I explain under what circumstances you found the note?” He was back to his irritated self. “That could jeopardize my job, Angie.”
“Don’t explain then. Like, why do you have to?”
“Because of records.”
“Oh.” I was speechless now. “Well, say you found it. Or I was consulting, or it was an accident that I found it.”
He said nothing for a few seconds to give himself cool off time. “Thanks, Angela. I’ll see you tomorrow. And please, don’t call me tonight anymore.” He chuckled to show he wasn’t mad. “I’m going to sleep now.”
“Oh, okay. That’s only if I go to sleep and I don’t remember something that happened during the day.” I said. I was rambling and stopped. “Good night.”
“Does it say anything on the back?”
“I didn’t look.”
" Wait! Can you read it out for me?”
“Uh…” I stammered and fumbled around my bed for the stupid note. I’d placed it down for a second, and now it was gone. I mumbled something incoherent as I looked around some more. “Success! Finally! It says; The beach, tonight.”
“Sounds suspicious, doesn’t it?” His unconvinced voice annoyed me. How could he downplay all my efforts like that? I’d risked a ‘friend’ for this.
“At least pretend to be interested. I went to great pains to find this thing, and your being sarcastic about it isn’t making my day feel any less bad.” I ranted.
“Good night, Angela.” I could hear him shake his head and chuckle.
“Yeah, whatever.”
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