Afterimage || #ONC2023 ||

3 (Amy)

Because Asa would argue she was right if I let him. Life wasn't linear for my little brother. He swore death wasn't the end but rather a red push-pin on a much larger map. Did I believe him?

I didn't want to. I hoped not. Where was the peace in that?

Salt-n-pepper ash rolled across my knee, hopping down to join the sand grains and brush that whisked toward the gutters. I rubbed my chin against my shirt collar, testing the weave. Above me, the bus stop sign flashed like fish scales, rocking to and fro when the wind kicked up. The constant breeze drew the smoke from my face, teasing the Marlboro's cherry tip. When had I started relying on cigarettes to mellow? To stop my heart racing and my throat constricting when my dark thoughts multiplied, outpacing my rational self? I couldn't remember, or maybe I didn't want to.   

Officer Lopez had allowed me a smoke when we first got to the police station, pushing a melamine ashtray across the table as an invitation. My fingers betrayed me then, trembling as I lit one. I pressed the cigarette against my dry lip and let it sit there as I squeezed my hands together, trying to rid myself of the death chill I'd caught off the body.

"I was hoping we'd never have to do this again," Lopez said. His medium build and mild height dominated his folding chair only. We both looked like children who had recently migrated from the kids table. He scratched at a phantom freckle on the flesh-toned folder before him; the simple, gold wedding band on his finger drew light across its shiny curve. His tanned fingers were thick because he was, the ring embedded deep below the knuckle.

I nodded and exhaled shakily, knocking the loose cigarette tip into a collection of day-old ash.

"Coffee?"

"Water. Please."

Lopez stood, his gun belt a personal flotation device around his hips. He adjusted it on his way to a 5-gallon glass jug turned upside down on a worn-out water cooler.

He was nice enough for a middle-aged cop. I knew him a little too well. Not in that way. It was more the way he'd dug through my family's metaphorical and financial closets after Polly's death that made me feel intimately connected to him. A worse feeling than a one-night stand, I was a hundred percent certain.

Lopez handed me a paper cup. I tamped out the cigarette and sipped, tasting the coated paper first.

"Thanks."

The folding chair creaked as he sat. His practical beige uniform blended into the off-white walls like dull camouflage. Even the Armstrong tiles on the floor were speckled brown as his boots.

"I want to go over your statement one last time." The tape recorder between us clicked on. Lopez tilted the microphone toward me, no doubt recording a static splash with his touch.

"Glad to see you're following the rules," I held his gaze and slumped in my chair. My jacket scrunched up to catch me. I folded my arms across my chest. "Just in case you want to blame me for this, too."

I don't know why I said it, but Lopez ignored the bait, glossing over it like an overly long word no one could pronounce, and flipped open the folder. The short blurb that was my life beamed up at him in hand-typed print—some clerk in the department preferred the out-of-sync results from a typewriter ribbon spool over a modern Microline.

"Amy Katharine Shippy. Twenty-nine years old. Caucasian. Female. Status: single. Address: 181 Farrow Lane. Mother: deceased. Father: deceased. One brother, Asa Miles Shippy." He paused. "Is that correct?"

"Reads like a bestseller," I said. My knees, stuffed under the interview table, didn't help my hostility which rose like yeasty dough the longer I sat in the tiny room.  Two a.m. was an unkind hour on any clock, but the overwhelming paranoia percolating in my gut was different. Witness statements at the station were usual under the circumstances. There were no accusations against me, but I felt pinned in place. Trapped. Found out—or about to be. My leg bounced as I shifted in my seat.