I’ve been working on a murder mystery story, tentatively titled “The Tragic Case of Allie Miller,” for the past several months. I know, mystery seems a little out of my genre, but it’s been fun to make something new. As of right now, I’m uncertain if I will post the entire story on the site, or turn it into a novella for publishing. At any rate, here’s a cool flyer AND an excerpt!
Tap-water ran cold over his hands; flecks of red loosened and slipped down the drain. The bathroom smelled strongly of antiseptic, and the clothes in the light blue water of the bathtub reeked of more than cleaning agents. A wig of dark, curly hair sat on the edge of the pristine, white sink like a tangled, ragged vermin, while stained makeup wipes filled the trash.
Stan stared at his face in the mirror, running his fingers through his light brown hair; methodically, he picked up his razor and began shaving away the light bristle on his chin. The metal felt cold against his burning skin. He finished, then splashed ice water onto his face, feeling cleaner by the second. A pitiful meow reached his ears, and a black and white paw slipped under the white bathroom door.
“Coming, coming,” he said.
Before he left the bathroom, he drained the tub and wrung out the clothes, before carrying them out. Immediately upon opening the door, his cat, Panda, was under his feet. Her complaints grew louder, and as he stepped towards the kitchen she ran off to her food bowl–always her food bowl. Stan threw his clothes in the washing machine and turned it on, pouring in twice the amount of soap than it needed, then followed his needy pet to where she sat, still howling, at her not-at-all-empty bowl. Still, he refilled it with fresh food and petted her butt while she ate.
“Good girl. I missed you, too.”
Afterwards, he strolled through the kitchen, across the white, cool, square tiles, felt more heat seep from the soles of his feet, and grabbed a banana. As he unpeeled it, he walked into his small living room, where several bookshelves sat against the far wall, in between them a window. A tv rested on a cheap table to the left and an armchair to the right. He sat down, flicking on the tv.
Immediately, the news confronted him. Most of it was blather. Word vomit for the masses to feel they were connected to reality. But he watched until late in the evening, when the real stuff aired. The man at the subway was found, and the police were searching, as expected. He felt nothing in particular, watching the blurred footage of the dead man. Then there was a short tidbit about old Jake’s activities before leaving this plane of existence–supporting a pesticide company that had been shown to make mice sick. Sometimes fatally so. Stan had been right. Feeling justified, he reached for the remote to turn the tv off, when the next big thing aired.
A man dressed in an upper-end suit and wearing thin, rectangular glasses walked onto a stage. He walked with an air of authority and grandiosity; in his hands he carried a brown leather briefcase and outside his pocket the chain of a shiny, new pocket watch dangled. On his neck, there was a little tattoo of an atom. As he began presenting what looked like some plans for more park space and green movements in NYC, Stan’s grip on his remote tightened. He leaned forward in his chair, tensed like a tight coil and ready to leap up, or maybe attack, and his eyes remained glued to the screen until the bitter end of the three minute clip. When it ended, Stan blinked several times, before finding the wherewithal to turn off the tv. Not even Panda’s meows got his attention, this time. With quivering hands and gritted teeth, he sat back, slowly.
They were closer than he had known.
Thanks for reading! As usual, questions and comments are welcome.
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