Influence

Chapter 20

When Jasper was four, not long after his father left, a man broke into the tiny house he shared with his mother. Jasper's mom had gone next door to bring an ailing neighbor a meal, leaving him napping in the home's sole bedroom. Awoken by the sound of the front door being forced open, Jasper wandered out of the bedroom towards the clatter, imagining his mother accidentally locked herself out of the house. He remembered most of the story from her recounting it to him when he was older, a second-hand recall of events he'd had firsthand knowledge of. But in his own memory, there had been a towering man with a thin body, hollowed eyes, and pock-marked skin.

The man hadn't expected Jasper to be there. He shoved the young boy back into the bedroom and then into its tiny closet. With a gravelly voice he told Jasper to stay there and so Jasper spent the next unknown period staring at his mother's modest collection of shoes. He was probably only there fifteen minutes or so before she came home and screamed his name, but to four-year-old Jasper, it might as well have been fifteen hours.

Now, sitting in a dingy room in a dingy police station, he was that little boy all over again. He could leave the room but also, he couldn't. He could tell them everything he knew or suspected, but not really. He was trapped for a short time that seemed like forever, and his impatience with the situation was growing.

"Goldie and I had our differences. You ever disagree with your family? It's normal."

"But in your case," Detective Ryan, a man in his late thirties with an enviable beard said. "The person you had differences with was murdered."

"Not because we disagreed on the value of carbon neutrality, I can assure you of that."

Detective Garcia, gripping her clipboard like it would explode if she let go of it, gave a sharp intake of breath. "Are you saying you know the reason she was murdered?"

If you don't want to be honest, answering a question with a question was always a good strategy. "When did I say anything remotely like that?"

"You are so sure she didn't die because of a quarrel with you, and that's because you know why she was killed."

"That's a huge stretch. Aren't you supposed to be better at this?"

"You know something. Or someone," she said. "You have an idea as to why someone would be motivated to kill your stepsister, only you won't share that with us. Were you romantically involved with Goldie?"

The concrete walls closed in. Jasper staring at his mother's shoes, the only light coming from a dim crack under the closet's door. "She's my stepsister. I've known her since she was in middle school. No, we weren't romantically involved. Jesus Christ!"

"It's a long-standing fan theory," Ryan told him, as though he wasn't already well acquainted with that trash.

"Seriously, fuck all of her fans and their asinine theories. We weren't blood related, but we regarded each other as brother and sister. Since day one."

Ryan wrote something down on his own clipboard. "What about Tam Martin. How long have you been with her?"

"Since never days ago. Tam is a co-worker. She can barely stand to be in the same room with me much less date me. You won't solve Goldie's murder by watching EpiGolds." He glanced at his watch, a high school graduation present from his mother that he wore on the same wrist as Goldie's friendship bracelet. "How long is this going to take? I have plans."

#

The detectives must hold a grudge against him. It didn't seem logical, but here they were dragging on this interview like as soon as they ended it, the world would be thrust into an eternal night. They made him go over the whole day of Goldie's death. What had happened at work, when had he left, where did he go, what frame of mind was she in when he last saw her, who was she with last, as far as he knew.