**Dedicated to my late mom, she loved crime/mystery novels.**
I'm dead.
Deceased.
Definitely not breathing.
Laying in my favorite striped bikini, the one that fits the absolute best, and shows off my surf body. But none of that matters now. Not when you're dead. I feel nothing too. Void of any physical sensation. Have you ever wondered what death would be like? It's a bit different from what you might think.
It's been about an hour give or take since I ended up here. The traffic around me is slowing. Honolulu is always crowded, except for the early morning hours. That is when no one is around. No one except the homeless and the business owners. Plus the occasional police officer. Right now though, it's becoming late morning. The sun is still high but it's beginning the slow descent across the sky. Shadows are forming and blocking the pavement where the high-rises tend to get in the burning orbs way.
"Oh my God!! Do you see that??"
"Someone call 911!!"
"Why isn't anyone helping her??"
"She is surely dead.."
"Keep walking..."
"Don't look at her!! Honey, the kids!!"
"I called 911 and they said they know, they are sending police!"
"Well where are they??"
"Jesus!! I'm going to throw a towel over her..."
There are a lot of people now, most stopping and some hurrying by. I'm kind of glad that one of them decided to half cover me. At least my face. The more I look at myself the more embarrassed I am. My eyes are open. I look strange indeed. You can feel embarrassed and be dead. I wonder what other emotions I can feel. I have time to explore that at least.
Sirens wail in the distance, echoing off the buildings. Honolulu is a very echo-y city. If you've ever been, you know what I am talking about. The water doesn't muffle the sounds very well until you hit the sand.
Cruisers race near and take up the road on both sides. They are blocking off the path for other cars, no one can drive by anymore. I guess that is good. Time for them to begin cordoning off the scene. I've seen it before a few times. Unfortunately. Not for a death like mine, but for homeless deaths. They were just slumped over though. I am not in that position.
"Get the tape up! Quickly ask if anyone saw anything and if not get them moving."
I guess this is the sergeant in charge. He looks to be anyhow.
"Christ, how did this happen?! Her body, never seen anything like it."
I guess I am an oddity in death, just like life. How fitting.
🩸
"She's going into the murder files. Make sure you do a thorough report, the coroner will be here soon. They'll do an autopsy but without a good report, we'll never find the perp."
"The murder files?"
"Yes dipstick, the huge file folder homicide keeps on murders. You know the one."
A lead detective has shown up on scene, taking over for the patrolmen and at least now my body has a white sheet over it. I look smaller somehow, being covered this way. Looking at yourself from this angle was interesting to say the least. But still weird.
The police hover. Talk to everyone, and I mean everyone. They are taking my death pretty serious. Which is how it should be I guess. I'm not an expert in these things though.
"Building owner is coming down now. Want to talk to him?" A younger detective asks the older one.
"Fuck no, not here. Let's go inside. Coroner just pulled up anyway, she will be taken away." The older detective says.
"You don't think the perp is watching do you?"
"He might be. Might be listening too. Hence going inside."
"Got it."
I died right outside of my condo building. Fell from the top of the roof I think, but I can't remember. My memory is wiped from the moments before it happened. Come to think of it, I only remember waking up this morning. That is it.
The beautiful steel and glass gleams as the hot sun shone directly onto half of its hulking structure. Those unlucky enough to have bought units in the rays merciless path have their shades down. Finding someone unlucky enough to have seen my body hurtling by will be impossible. Most likely, no one saw.
A large car arrives next to where I lay. 'Honolulu Coroner' is scrawled across the side. An equally large Samoan man exits. They look similar in more than one way, the coroner and the hearse. It is oddly funny.
The detectives though, they finally leave to go inside. I debate what to do and settle on following them in. If I ever want answers as to why I'm suddenly displaced from the land of the living, they will be the ones to give them to me.
My body does more than float!
I can travel without flying.
Suddenly I'm in the managers office, as if I teleported, 'thinking' my way there. Death is weird.
"We were so saddened to find out Ms. Miller was the victim."
The manager knew me. I didn't remember him though. Curious.
"Ms. Miller you say?"
"Yes, Leilani Miller. She lived on the fourth floor, 410. You didn't ID her yet?"
"Tell us what you know about her." The older detective says, authority in his voice.
"Well, she lived on the fourth floor as I said, and she was young. Let me pull up her mortgage paperwork."
The police didn't know who I was, until now. I suppose it made sense. I didn't seem to have fallen with ID on me. Nothing fits inside a bikini but the required body parts.
"Ah, here it is. She's 23. Date of birth is November 2nd, 1999. Excellent credit, used First Pacific Bank for the loan. Her interest rate was remarkably low for someone so young.."
"Can you tell us anything more about her? Such as who she knew in the building, socialized with, that sort of thing. We need to piece together her last few days alive."
The phone on the desk rings.
"Uh huh. Yes. I'll be right there."
"Sorry detectives, I need to tend to a situation. Can we reschedule this for later?"
🩸
The Honolulu Morgue is cold.
Not temperature wise as I can't distinguish that now, but cold looking. Sterile. Void of color. At least I can still see colors!
I lay on 'the slab' as its always been referred to in movies. A bare metal table. My bikini is cut off. I have my birthday suit on now, which should embarrass me but oddly it doesn't. A woman doctor is studying the marks on my mangled torso. It is rather gruesome, looking at myself now. At the scene it was somehow easier.
Trust fills my senses, do I still have the ability to trust? I guess so because that's how I feel. I need to get back to the detectives so I 'leave'. In a blink I am now next to the desks labeled 'homicide' in small plaques.
"That guy wasn't kidding. She did have excellent credit. How does a woman that young get such a high score?"
"Rich parents..or she started working at it early."
"How about no parents. They both died two years ago. Car wreck on the mainland."
"No shit? Shit. That's rough."
My parents were dead. I knew that. Or remembered that rather. Maybe I'd see them here? Hope filled me just thinking about that.
"DMV says no tickets. No arrest records either. She graduated from James Campbell High School in Ewa Beach, class of 2017. She moved to Honolulu a year ago."
"Yep. Graduated from University of Hawaii at Monoa, BS Hospitality Management in 2021."
"Where was her place of employment?"
This was surreal now, seeing my body lying on the street wasn't for some reason but this was. Watching detectives dredge up your entire past bit by bit just seemed so....weird. They have it correct though. I did attend high school in Ewa Beach then immediately at U of H in Honolulu. My parents didn't even push me to go, I was pretty self driven.
"Hilton Hawaiian Village. She's listed as a 'Guest Service Coordinator' on their website. Check it out."
"Fuck, she was pretty. Looked far different today."
"That type of fall should have smashed her like a melon. She held up good if you ask me."
If I was still alive, I'd swallow a lump in my throat or gasp. But now, nothing happened physically. Just a feeling of sickness.
"I'll say. So she worked at the Hilton. It's a huge hotel, one of our biggest. Shit. This is going to be a huge pain in the ass interviewing."
"Yep. Guest Service Coordinator sounds like a job that mingles with everyone. Just our luck right?"
My former job now, well, it wasn't exactly a commingling job. Not with guests actually, not in person. I spent the majority of my work days in an office without a window. A cubical rather. I did cross paths with just about every single section head in the hotel though. Just wait until they figure that out. Their list of people to interview will hemorrhage.
Hopefully not like my mutilated head.
~ This book is Copyrighted by K E Jennings and only available on Wattpad. if you are reading this on another site, it has been stolen without permission or monetary payment to the said author. ~
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*Fun Hawaii Fact: Hawaii is the only state in the US with two official languages (English and Hawaiian, not to be confused with Pidgin).