It was something Melody never admitted. She kept it buried deep within a small pocket of her heart, where even she would not be able to easily find it. But the truth was there, and the truth was that she had wanted to kill the man who killed her father.
Melody knew she looked insane when she walked into the police station. Her mother had screamed when she had seen Melody that morning. The poor woman had chased after Melody with a towel, trying to remove the layers upon layers of makeup. But Melody wanted to keep it. She was reminded of something she had once heard. After the assassination of her husband, Jackie Kennedy refused to take off the blood-splattered pink Chanel suit she was wearing. She said, "I want them to see what they have done to Jack." Melody was no Jackie Kennedy, and what remained of her father's blood had been cleaned off the dirty ground. But she could show what had been taken from her on her face.
The drive to the station had taken over an hour. She probably could have gotten there in less time than that, but she had wanted to take her time.
As she drove, she thought about what she would be doing if her father wasn't dead. Working on her final paper, definitely. Classes, too. A Shakespeare class, a workshop writing class, a course about the ethics of journalism, and a political science class. She had pushed all of the required literature classes until her last year, but she couldn't remember why.
Melody also drove slowly because she needed to plan.
The problem with deciding you wanted to kill someone was you had to figure out how you were going to kill them. The guy was in a holding cell. He would probably get sent to prison, and Melody couldn't touch him there. Maybe she could get him when she was talking to him. That was ridiculous, of course. She would be at a police station. Surrounded by cops, the people who arrested people who killed others. But then again, who knows? The police at the gas station had seemed nice to her. They probably didn't carry any love for the guy they had locked up. Maybe they would give her five minutes alone with the guy, no cameras or security guards. But then what would she do?
What was she going to do, anyway?
Melody decided she would decide what she was going to do when she saw the man. She assumed the man was scrawny and unhealthy. He wasn't the first drug addict Melody had ever seen. Young teen addicts had often shown up in group therapy, sent in by wealthy parents and shrinks. Some part of Melody had always been angry at them. Most of them had chosen their vice. They had chosen to take those drugs for the momentary high. They probably only meant to try it once. Or a few times at parties. Or they just wanted to do it every once in a while, like the Hollywood stars. They didn't mean to become addicted, so Melody tried to not hate them. But they had started their dangerous path downwards. Meanwhile, Melody had a chemical imbalance in her brain, courtesy of bad fucking luck. All the addicts had been skinny and their hands never stopped twitching. Sometimes, Melody would pretend they were scrawny, underfed street cats. So, if the man who killed her father resembled one of those feral cats, then he did not pose a threat to Melody without a gun. But there was always a chance the man wouldn't be a scrawny, skin-and-bones addict. If he was big and strong, Melody would have to rethink her tactic. Then again, she didn't have a tactic to rethink.
For some unfathomable reason, Melody had a feeling she would never reach the station. She imagined a large semi truck crashing into her convertible. Or, the man looking at his phone two lanes away would lose control of his car, and crash into the vehicle next to his, and then Melody would spin out and hit the barrier. Or a tire would blow and go through her windshield, or the engine would explode, or her brakes would stop working and she would hit the car in front of her. But even though Melody imagined so many ways she could die before she got there, Melody made it to the police station, alive and well.
The police there all glanced at each other as Melody passed them. Maybe they were used to seeing crazy people walk in on the regular, and they thought Melody was another one. In school, Melody had taken a journalism class where they covered case studies. One of the cases was a man who walked into his local police station at least once a week, claiming he had murdered someone or other. He would become one of the spectators outside a crime scene, try to admit to the murder, tell them that he didn't remember murdering the person or not, but the methods used seemed to be something he would do. Of course, none of the confessions ever turned out to be anything, and after the first four murders he said he had done, the police disregarded anything the man said. Melody had thought that was rather clever if the man was actually planning to murder someone. He could admit to a murder he had done and nothing would ever happen to him.
The cop who had spoken the night before was behind the desk. She squinted at Melody, clearly trying to figure out why she recognized her.
"I'm here to talk to the person in lockup," she said.
The police officer nodded. "You're the kid from last night, right? You can come with me."
The cop led Melody through a door. "I'm not supposed to be doing this, you know." She was calm, cool in her uniform.
"He killed my dad."
"I know. That's the only reason I'm doing this. My dad died a few months ago, too, and I know if someone had done it to them, there would be some hell to pay."
Melody tried to memorize everything that was happening as the officer brought her through gates and doors using a key card. But a sudden sleepy exhaustion came over her, and she found it difficult to even stay on her feet and to keep her eyes open.
There were only three holding cells in the station, the cop said. She unlocked the door and held it open. "He's in the second cell. I can give you ten minutes maybe, but try to keep it under five."
Melody gulped, her heart fluttering anxiously in her chest. She nodded and walked in. She was wearing a pair of black suede wedges, the only black shoes she could find in the house that fit her. The heels made a loud echoing noise on the concrete. Usually, that sound would make Melody feel confident. But now, it just made her feel self-conscious.
There was no one in the first cell. That made her glad. Before she glanced at the middle cell, she looked at the third cell. There was someone in there. They were on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. It was a man with long, stringy hair that hung over the side. Melody swallowed. "Hello?" she whispered. The man didn't flinch. "Hello," she said again, louder. Again, no response. They weren't alone, but it appeared he wasn't listening. So Melody looked into the one in the middle.
The figure was curled up on the floor in the corner. It was dark, and Melody wasn't able to make out any features.
"What's your name?" Melody said. Her voice was ice-cold and hung in the air.
The figure flinched. Clearly, he had heard her and was listening. Melody waited.
"I want to know what your name is," Melody said.
The figure flinched again but kept his head in his arms. Melody fought the urge to growl like a feral animal. The man was small. Maybe Melody could just grab him and pull him into the bars. She could get revenge— or at least a tiny taste of revenge— right then and there.
"You killed my father last night. Look at me."
The man's head jerked up, and Melody took a step back. The man looked like a skeleton that had ill-fitting skin pulled over it. The skin was wrinkled in some places and dry and cracking in others. For a second, Melody thought he didn't have eyes, only skin yanked angrily over the eye sockets. But then he opened his eyes. Even in the darkness, Melody could see they were red and sunken.
"What did you say?" His voice was something awful. It was as if he had been screaming for a long time. Melody shuttered.
"I said you killed my dad. I want to know—" Melody's voice caught uncomfortably. "I want to know why."
The man began shaking. "No, no, I didn't."
"What? What are you saying?" Melody bristled. "They saw you on video. It was you. Everyone saw you shoot him." That wasn't entirely true. Melody herself hadn't watched the video. She wanted to wait. The fact that her father was dead had not sunken in yet. She knew he had been killed. She didn't realize yet that he was dead.
That was a truth that would take a long time to set in.
"But I didn't, I couldn't have..." the man's voice broke off, and all Melody could hear was wheezing breaths. He was sobbing, Melody realized.
"Stand up," she ordered. She approached the cell and wrapped her hands around the cold metal bars. "I want to see your face."
To Melody's surprise, the man stood. He was much taller than Melody, and she had to turn her head to look at his face. His hair was shaved short, in an almost militaristic style. His whole body shook and quivered, and it seemed he couldn't get his eyes to stay in one place. It seemed he was trying to focus on Melody's face. Had he been anyone else, Melody would have appreciated the effort. But not it just annoyed her. Her grip on the bars tightened.
"I want to know what your name is," she said. Melody shook her head then. "No. I want you to know my father. The man you killed."
"I couldn't have killed someone." The man's eyes were widened. "I didn't. I couldn't."
Melody took a step back. "You don't remember." She shook her head. "Tell me what you remember from last night."
The man began shaking more. "I don't— I didn't— I need my medication." The man held his head in his hands. "I need my medication!"
"Medication?" Melody said. "Wait, are you—"
"I need my medication!" The man slammed his hand against the bars. Melody jumped back.
The door to the room opened, with the cop looking concerned. "Is everything okay?" she asked.
"I need my medication!" the man shouted again.
The cop rolled her eyes. "Oh, he's going on about that again."
"What medication?" Melody asked.
"Something a shrink prescribed him. Says he's got PTSD from when he got hurt fighting. They gave him pain meds, which he got hooked to. Clearly." She glared at the man.
"He's in therapy?" Melody said. She felt herself shrinking, the confidence and rage she had entered with bleeding from her.
The man began openly sobbing, fat tears rolling down his face and splashing on the dirty floor.
He could have been you, an oily voice slithered through her mind.
Melody backed away more. The man howled and cried. The cop raised an eyebrow. "You good?" she asked Melody.
"Uh—" Melody's back hit something solid and cold. She spun around. She had kept walking backward until her back hit the wall. "I need to go."
The cop either didn't notice Melody's shaking hands and short, unsteady breaths, or she didn't care. "Sure. Come with me."
Melody never looked back at the man. She had preferred him when he was a shadow. So she chose to remember him as one. He had been nothing more than a skeleton with skin. He had no name. He had no face. He was just a shadow in a dream.
It could have been me.
As she walked out of the police station, the sun felt warm and inviting. The spring air was fresh and clean. Melody closed her eyes and turned her face upward. The rays of the sun warmed her face. She breathed in deeply, and let it out slowly. Melody could feel her chest rising and falling with each breath. She could feel as the wind rustled her hair and clothes.
"Are you alright?" a voice asked.
Melody opened her eyes and looked around. There was a boy there, a backpack strapped to his back and his hands in his pockets. His head was tilted to the side, and he was squinting against the sunlight.
"Yes?" Melody said, not entirely sure what he had just said.
The boy nodded. He clearly didn't believe her. "Okay," he said. "Have a good day."
He walked past her, and Melody watched him as he walked into the station.
Melody didn't know then that she would soon learn the boy's name was Thomas, and he was the son of a police officer. She didn't know then that one day, she would love him. Or that one day, she would hate him.
Melody's mother attended the trial. They were both asked to testify. Melody knew she really should go, wearing all black and crying mascara-darkened tears that would elegantly fall from her face onto the marble floor. After all, there's no better way to argue how much the shadow had changed the world and ruined lives than by showing the wife and little girl he left behind. She could have talked for hours. She could have talked about how her father didn't see her graduate, wouldn't be able to walk her down the aisle when she got married. Or she could say about her father had planned to retire and take Melody and her mother on a trip to hike Mount Fuji, and had been training for years. But Melody didn't want to go there and put on a show. So she stayed at home and listened to her phone buzz and ping endlessly. She had left the phone turned on and on the charger since she had gotten home. Once news had gotten out about the murder, it seemed anyone and everyone who knew the family felt the need to call.
She listened to the phone, the birds outside, and held the glass bottle in her hands so the lip rolled against her teeth. Melody couldn't be sure, but she thought she heard a piano somewhere far away.