The Death Agreement (7 page)

Mary turned in her chair and
opened a file cabinet. "I have a story for you," she said, sliding
files back and forth. "I wrote it back when Mr. McDonger was in
charge around here. Ah, here it is." She turned back to me and
placed a laminated front page article on her desk. The featured
picture was of an alley crisscrossed with yellow police tape, the
red brick buildings had taken on a slight blue grow from the light
of the police cruisers parked on the street.

I picked up the laminate, but Mary
had already begun telling me the story. Her eyes seemed focused on
something far away, so I placed it back on her desk and
listened.

"A few years ago," she said,
"Natasha Banders, a woman living in Baltimore City, called the
police to report her daughter missing from a crib. The detectives
found a broken pane of glass on the back door. Less than three
hours later, the dogs found her daughter's body in a
dumpster.

"She had been tortured, Jon.
Sodomized with a hot curling iron, then strangled. I was there
covering the story. I don't have the words to describe the woman's
agony as the police pulled the baby from the garbage.

"
'My
little girl! Oh god, someone murdered my little girl!'
Rage filled her eyes, and she screamed,
'I'll kill you! Come out'n face me. I'll slit
your throat.'

"Then she ran up to random
bystanders and yelled in their faces,
'was
it you? I know it was you!'
She went on
like that, absolutely hysterical, until one of the officers wrapped
a blanket around her shoulders and pulled her away from the crime
scene.

"I felt her pain, every ounce. We
all did. The horror she was going through, the terror the little
girl had suffered….

"No one deserves that. This
well-liked community woman had gone to work at the docks each
morning to help feed her family. She had no enemies. She never had
a run-in with the law. Why her? What could she have done to deserve
the wrath of a monster?

"The worst part…a week later, when
the police discovered a Chinese restaurant had installed a camera
to watch the alley, it was Mrs. Banders who had dumped her
daughter's body…. So don't blame yourself. Anyone can be
fooled."

We sat in silence for a while,
then I finally said, "I'm not blaming myself."

Of course I did. If Taylor had
been harboring murderous thoughts his whole life, or if he had
slipped into insanity during the war, I should've noticed. I
should've protected his family. Their deaths were on me.

Mary reached across her desk and
put her hand on mine. "Hey?"

"Yeah?"

"I might be wrong. Like you said,
maybe someone set him up."

"But I'm the only one the police
are looking at. Most of them are convinced I'm a
killer."

Mary nodded. She looked at me much
the same way that Yang had looked at me in the morgue—with hunger
in her eyes. "Well," she said, smiling slightly, "now that would be
a story."

SECTION IV - ATTEND
FUNERAL

The Naval Station's legal department had finally
confirmed that they had Taylor's will on file.

As stated in The Death Agreement,
his will had been adjusted, the change small. In the event no
immediate family members survived, I would become the executor of
the estate. That meant I became responsible for burying my best
friend, who may or may not have murdered his family.

Once I had Taylor's will in hand,
I used it as proof to get his body released and delivered to
Hardesty's Funeral Home. The funeral director needed a day to
prepare, which was fine because I had other important duties
requiring my attention. You see, the executor takes on the
responsibility of asset dissolution. Because Lorie died before
Taylor, he inherited everything, and since the rest of Taylor's
family was also deceased, the whole estate went to me.

This, of course, didn't sit well
with Lorie's parents. To complicate matters more, Yang told me that
the inheritance could be considered a motive, and I should tread
lightly. It was okay, I told him. I already knew what to
do.

The hardest thing I ever did was
make that call to Lorie's mother. Like an idiot, I tried to offer
my sympathies, and suddenly realized this woman probably wanted to
see me burn, so instead of a heartfelt condolence, I began to spill
my guts into the receiver:

"Ma'am, I understand that my voice
is the last thing you want to hear. Nothing from me will ease your
pain, but I swear to you, this wasn't my doing. Maybe Jesse…." I
trailed off, unable to say the words. Lorie's mother hadn't said
anything but she hadn't slammed the phone down either, so I
continued, "Maybe someone else…I don't know. The police are
investigating, and I am cooperating fully. Right now, the most
important thing is getting Lorie and Jon sent down to Georgia. They
need to be laid to rest by those who love them most."

I paused for a breath, imagining
Lorie's mother on the other end of the line, listening to me
rambling while trying her best not to give me the satisfaction of
hearing her cry.

"The arrangements have been made,"
I said. "Once the assets are liquid, half of the money in the
estate will be forwarded to your account. The other half will go to
Jesse's grandfather so he can bury the rest of his family. I'll
take care of Jesse myself, out of my own pocket."

By the time I finished explaining,
I was sobbing into the phone, too.

"I'm sorry for your loss," I said,
"and I hope God is looking after them. Please call if there's
anything I can do."

She didn't respond; she didn't
need to. I waited patiently just to let her know I would be there
no matter what. When I heard the soft click of her phone hanging
up, I knew she had accepted the offer, and possibly my sympathies
as well.

Next, I called Jesse's
grandfather, Howard Taylor. He accepted my proposal in much the
same way, only prior to hanging up he did say one thing: "Wiiilll
seeend floweeers," he said as if gasping for breath, a hacking
cough punctuated each word.

All in all, heart-ripping as it
was, the whole ordeal went better than expected.

***

Taylor's funeral had been another
matter altogether. The director, Mr. Hardesty, greeted me at the
door. He was a black man with a short-cropped beard, and the way he
held himself reminded me of a distinguished butler.

"I don't advise informing the
public of the viewing schedule, nor do I advise printing the
obituary until after the event takes place."

I needed to tilt my head back to
look him in the eye. "What about his friends?" I asked.

"Mr. Randon, with all due respect,
sir, it might be best to cancel the service. It's highly possible
former friends will not attend. How can I say this
delicately?"

"I'd appreciate it if you would
just say it plainly."

"As you wish. The deceased has
been accused of serious crimes, and to be blunt, sir, you yourself
are the subject of an ongoing investigation. I implore you, don't
advertise this funeral, or else you may regret it."

As he spoke, my first reaction had
been to punch the pompous bastard, but then I picked up on the fear
in his voice. The man was scared of me and yet he still gave his
honest opinion, which I begrudgingly admired.

"Thank you. I respect your candor.
It is good advice, but I made a promise, you see. Some contracts
are written in ink and others are written in blood."

Mr. Hardesty nodded. "In that
case, I will have him ready for tomorrow." He shook my hand and
left the parlor.

As a man who deals in death, I
knew he would understand.

After he had closed the door,
leaving me alone with the soft jazz music playing in the small
office, I browsed through the catalog of caskets, considering his
advice.

The Death Agreement required an
obituary. However, nothing in the document specified
when
it needed to be
printed.

I called my favorite reporter,
Mary Stalling.

"Jon?" she answered. "Is
everything okay?"

"Hi, Mary. I'm all right. I wanted
to ask a favor. Could you please delay Taylor's obituary? I think
too many people would show up and none of them would come to pay
their respects."

"No need," she said.

"What?"

"I never sent it to the editing
department."

"Why not? We had a deal, didn't
we?"

"
Have
a deal," she corrected. "But I
knew you would call, so I changed it to go out next
Tuesday."

"I, uh…I don't know what to
say."

"Thanks would work
fine."

"Thanks."

"You're welcome. But Jon, I can't
keep this under wraps forever. Once the obituary is out, I'll need
to print a story."

"I know. You'll get a proper
interview after the funeral is over. I promise."

***

The service began at three in the
afternoon on March 15
^th
. As expected, no one
showed up. Mr. Hardesty had laid Taylor out in a simple maple wood
box, the only one I could afford.

Howard Taylor had sent flowers like
he said he would, but no other decorations adorned the cheap
casket. That sole arrangement felt like a disgrace. Someone at the
flower shop must have messed up the order. Instead of a message
about loss, hope, or forgiveness, the pink silk banner around the
large bouquet read:
Get Well
Soon.

"Damned idiots," I said, then sat
there silently trying to piece it all together.

People don't just snap like that.
That kind of thing doesn't really happen. In the back of my mind I
knew it happened all the time. We've all seen the news: Teen stabs
his parents to death. Mother drowns her children. Brother shoots
his brother.

The world is fucked up, people are
fucked up,
everything is fucked up.
We hang on to the illusion that reality is
orderly, when in fact it is pure chaos. So who's really insane? The
person that gives in to the madness, or the person that pretends
the madness isn't waiting just below the surface?

A voice came from behind me, "The
name is Goodtime."

I whipped my head around to see a
man with bloodshot eyes and greying hair. He wore an old-fashioned,
grey three-piece suit and brown wing-tipped leather shoes that had
been polished to a mirror shine.

"Jesus, you scared the piss out of
me."

"Didn't mean to startle ya, my
boy." The strange-looking man smiled and reached out a hand.
"Goodtime," he said again. "Alan Goodtime."

"Jon Randon. Are you a friend of
Jesse Taylor?"

"Not a friend, per se." He spoke
with a slight Southern drawl but I picked up a hint of English as
well. Maybe there was something else too, as if the man had spent a
fair amount of time traveling overseas. "We met online a while
back," he continued. "Jesse read something I had written, and it
turned out we had a few things in common. Real shame what happened,
my boy. Whole family gone, just like…." He snapped his fingers,
"
That
."

I nodded.

He said, "You're not related, are
you?"

"Not by blood. How did you hear
about the service?"

"That's for the best. Oh, I
haven't spoken to Jesse in a while, so I did some checking, heard
some whispers here and there. Thought I would come pay my respects.
Like I said, real shame."

"Well, Mr. Goodtime, it isn't much
of a service, but why do you say that?"

He cocked his head and squinted as
if confused. "Say what now?"

"You said that it's for the best.
Why?"

He grinned. "Figure of speech.
Making conversation."

"Oh. I thought…I thought…no, never
mind." I shook my head.

"No harm in admitting it if you're
going to dismiss it so easily." Alan Goodtime laughed. "You're
right, I did mean something by it. I meant it is for the best that
you two weren't blood. He'd have done you in too, no doubt. Same as
the rest of 'em."