Throw Away The Key

1. Murderer

He gets the call early Tuesday morning and almost immediately he senses something is wrong. It's his mother…his mother never calls him. Instantly he thinks of his father, his older brother and his sister-in-law, and his mind is racing through all the possible reasons for the call. His mother assures him that his family is fine but there's something in her voice, some lingering hesitation that sets him on edge like nails dragging across a chalkboard. He wants to ask, he needs to know, but he's afraid to.

Something is very, very wrong and his mother is speaking softly in that quiet, gentle voice she used to use when she was trying to comfort him when he was a child. His grip on the phone is tight enough to make the plastic creak beneath his fingers but he hardly notices it. Then she says it, three simple words that hit him like a sledgehammer in the gut: Angelina is dead.

The kitchen suddenly seems huge, a vast, yawning chasm of linoleum and disinfected countertops. Some kind of disbelieving noise escapes from his throat and he swallows convulsively. He tries to form words but he's suddenly forgotten how to speak and all that comes out is a shuddering breath instead. His mother is trying to comfort him, empty consolation that's coming from thousands of miles away over a series of telephone wires. Angelina is dead…Angelina is dead…Angelina is dead…

He feels his knees buckle beneath him and he's sitting in a kitchen chair now, suddenly bone tired and more weary than he's ever felt in his entire life. It feels like the entire house has fallen down on top of him and he doesn't even have the energy to brush the dust away.

He hears himself mumble "when?" but the word comes out more like a croak than a question. Frankly, he's amazed it came out at all; his throat feels like it's coated in hot tar and sandpaper. His mother tells him it happened yesterday, possibly last night, and that she had gotten the call from Angelina's uncle earlier that morning. He remembers him vaguely, a huge man with hands like catcher's mitts and an easy-going grin always plastered on his face. He'd helped raise Angelina and her brothers when they were younger, he'd been there for his college graduation. Of course he had called his mother; he and Angelina had dated pretty seriously for a while and there had been very light talk of marriage a couple of times. His family was practically part of her family and it only seemed natural they should be informed of her death.

His mother is still speaking but her words are little more than noise in his ears. She's telling him where the funeral is going to be held and what day, she's asking him if he plans to be there. He's catching bits and pieces of her conversation, random words and phrases, but they're swirling and twisting around in his head like tumbleweeds caught in the middle of a hurricane and he barely hears anything. Angelina is dead…Angelina is dead…Angelina is dead…

He doesn't want to know, really he doesn't, but a form of morbid curiosity forces the question out of his mouth before he can stop himself. "How?"

His mother hesitates, the pause heavy and weighted like a living thing, and he can practically hear her trying to come up with some way to avoid the question. He asks again, a little more insistent this time because now that it's out there in the open, he has to know. He needs to know.

There's another brief pause but she relents and tells him that Angelina had been shot. She hadn't just been killed, she'd been murdered. That realization is bad enough but there's something his mother isn't saying, something she's leaving out of the conversation. He coaxes her on and her voice is fluttery and nervous like a bird trying to escape when she finally does answer. She tells him Angelina's uncle said something about her being killed by a Grimm and suddenly the conversation takes on an entirely different tone. Angelina was killed by a Grimm…shot by a Grimm…he only knows one Grimm but that's impossible…he would never-