Gluskin & Ichor Family Funeral Home

Part 9 (Spit out the blood.)

Days got colder and colder, Wren noticed she started smoking more and more as her stress levels rose, an obvious sign considering she constantly smelled like cigarettes now. Hestia couldn't help but notice as dark circles grew under her eyes and became bloodshot.

"Wren, you need to sleep, you've been hunched over this desk for too long." She had said one night, it was late at night, Wren still wasn't asleep, granted she couldn't sleep either, that's why she was pestering Wren to get some rest.

"I'll sleep later," Wren stated bluntly, not meeting her eyes, still glued onto a stack of notes she was writing out to give to the detective tomorrow.

Hestia ripped the piece of paper out of her hands, glancing over it before slamming it back out onto the desk. 

"Sleep, Wren." she glared, Wren finally met her eyes with a tired and frustrated gaze. "You need to sleep, you'll never get anywhere with this case if you're burned out."

"I don't care, I need to get to the bottom of this, give it to me." she held out her hand aggressively, not breaking eye contact with her.

"No." 

"What?!" Wren gawked, she couldn't believe her ears, was Hestia seriously doing this to her now?!

Wren jumped up from her seat, making Hestia back up in shock, paper still in hand with messy handwriting scrawling some nonsense about where Ryeo's body was found.

"Give it to me Godammit!" Wren lunged at Hestia grabbing onto her shoulders as Hestia thrashed about

"STOP IT WREN!" she shouted, loud enough for it to echo through the entire funeral home, making Wren pause in shock.

"Look at yourself!" she said in desperation "You're going insane, please... just get some sleep."

Unfortunately, she was right, Wren hadn't been in a proper state of mind since her mother was killed and her father went missing.

"Punch me in the mouth." Wren stared at Hestia.

"What?!" she gasped out, "Wren are you insane?!"

"I'm not sure, punch me in the mouth, help me find out. Punch me as hard as you can Hessy."

Hestia pulled back her arm, swinging it forward fast, nailing Wren in the jaw bone, knocking her back abruptly and almost making her hit the ground.

"Agh..." Wren groaned in pain, covering her mouth with her hand as she tried her best to power through the pain, "That hurt, thanks Hessy."

"Spit out the blood." Hestia insisted. "Know it's still sitting in your mouth, I just wanna make sure I didn't knock out your tooth." she worried.

Wren spat onto the creaky hardwood floors, blood hitting the floor with a gross splat sound, no tooth, but still a lot of blood.

"I bit my tongue, that hurt," she complained, pressing a finger into the side of her mouth, scraping out even more blood in the process. "Well now I know I'm not crazy..." she sighed with relief, blood trickling past her lips.

"So, you invited me here at this time why?" Tammy asked, sitting on top of one of the police station's cheap metal and plywood desks, shifting her weight forward.

"I'm taking you to the last crime scene we went to," Sasha replied quickly, ushering her out of the door with him.

A chill ran up Tammy's spine as they reached the point in the woods, the abandoned house barely visible through the thick and dark brush, the headlights from Sasha's car only lit up a few feet in front of him, there was a thick fog in front of them. Quickly, Sasha shut off the headlight of his car, reaching behind his seat and pulling out two police flashlights.