Continuing the Fade into White Story...

I had to go on because the character has burrowed into my brain.  I watched a Pirates of the Caribbean movie over the holiday AND the directors cut of Blade Runner and read, as I mentioned, Odd Hours, by Koontz.  They all got mashed up in my brain and spewed out Winston.

Green is the colour of my true loves eyes… That tune just popped into my head suddenly.

“Hey, are you listening to me?  I followed you from the police station. I figure if they let you go you maybe didn’t kill her but know something about it… You’re not just some idiot who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time are you?”

“That’s exactly who I am, but I am also a private dick and I possess the odd ability of stumbling upon the truth of things.  I can find out who killed your daughter and be back here for happy hour.”

“You missed happy hour Winston.  It was three hours ago.  We’re coming up to closing time now” said Ben, the helpful bar man.  Ben and I go way back, back to the time I got banned from my last watering hole, a month ago now, though it feels like longer.

“Happy hour tomorrow”, I say to the dead girl’s grandmother while pushing a ten across the bar towards Ben with a wink. A good barkeep is better than a mother at caring for the lost boys. 

“Don’t’ you need a retainer or something?” The plump 60ish woman was scrunching up her nose at me in an unconscious expression of disgust or suspicion.  Body language:  You learn how to read people in this business.

“Do you have any information for me NOW? For instance, did you happen to see anyone in the alley before you got hit over the head with that shovel?

“It was a shovel! Thanks for telling me!  I was thinking frying pan but that’s just because I’ve been knocked out by one of those already.  Silly really, why would anyone take a frying pan into an alleyway?”

“Okay, so it was me that hit you. But I got there too late. She was already dead and I thought you killed her so I hit you.”

“So who put the gun in my hand?”

“It had to be Ruckshack. I heard someone coming and I got scared and I ran. He must have come back, but I can’t be sure, maybe he was late too and there was some one else.”

“There’s a lot you’re not telling me.  Perhaps you should go to the police.”

“I can’t.  You see, there was some trouble that is still not finished and well, there’s my son missing too.  This is message on my phone that Brandy left me:

 

Gran, I got a call to meet Ruckshack behind the Funeral Parlor at Main and Danforth but dad’s not answering his phone and I can’t confirm…I don’t know what I should do? Can you call me back?

 

It was the voice I heard before I passed out. It was not the voice of her grandmother. It was Brandy's voice.
            But that was impossible. She was already dead.