Click here to see the previous post in the series: Fade.
“Able-Bodied” was the first story I wrote specifically for a market. In this case, an ezine had launched out of Ft. Wayne, IN, called Strange, Weird, and Wonderful. “Able-Bodied” was written after pondering the meaning of the magazine’s title for several months. The submission led to an acceptance and a dialog with the editor-in-chief D.L. Russell. D.L. is a hell of a writer in his own right, and we have since become friends and he’s a valued colleague. Click here to check out his short story collection Hell is An Awfully Big City to see a cover that helped influence the cover to my own collection.
Able Bodied appeared in the January 2010 issue of the publication. It was also featured among the first Best Of anthology A Big Book of Strange Weird and Wonderful, Volume I.
Setup: None. “Able Bodied” is a story that best unfolds from the beginning, so here are the first words of the tale.
Police detective Todd Harding stood over the sprawled body. Today was The Whiz Kid’s turn to die.
Brad “The Whiz Kid” Zither lay on his stomach, brains leaking onto the polished oak floor, a look of slack-jawed stupor frozen on his youthful profile. Inches away, a ground-stone paperweight in the shape of the state of Indiana laid on the floor, the bumpy border of Lake Michigan smeared in crimson. The polished surface reflected a bright red stain―brighter than the crushed section on the back of the Whiz-Kid’s skull, which already began turning a gelatinous purple.
Ten years ago, The Whiz Kid exploded onto the technology scene, growing a “freeware add-on” office assistant program into a multi-million-dollar computer software company.
Tonight, The Whiz Kid had barricaded himself in the extravagant personal library of his luxurious mansion on three acres of the most secured, private woodland just north of Indianapolis, but that couldn’t save him from death.
In a few hours, The Whiz Kid would lie out on a slab alongside the homeless vet who died tonight of exposure in White River State Park, worth no more and no less.
The crime scene assistants hovered, anxious to clear away the body and start bagging evidence. Detective Harding shook his head, waving them off. He gave the study a quick preliminary glance. On the wall, the safe door hung open, exposing an empty metal pit.
The noise of a scuffle at the entrance broke Harding from his reverie. An angry slender blonde stormed through the door, followed closely by the rookie Rodriguez—his dark skin beneath the stubble of his shaved head glistening, even in this low light. He shot the rookie an annoyed glance. “What the hell, Rodriguez! I said no one enters the crime scene.”
“Sorry, Detective. She surprised me.” Though almost a foot shorter than the athletic woman, Rodriguez gripped her upper arm through the worn, ratty-looking knitted-blue sweater draped over the distraught woman’s shoulders. Her hair lay helter-skelter, as if she’d just woken up.
The woman pushed at the rookie’s hands. “I’m not ‘no one!’” she snapped, grammatical structure apparently the least of her concerns. As if fighting a draft, the woman crossed her arms over her chest, hands balled into fists at opposite shoulders, entwined in the knotted yarn of her sweater. Her right hand had clawed a large hole into the left shoulder of the tattered garment. “I’m Lauren Zither. This is my home, too! I want to know what you’re doing to find my husband’s killer.”
Detective Harding, usually the tallest and bulkiest person in the room at over 6’ and 240 lbs, knew he could create a considerable and intimidating presence, aided by his burr haircut, when the need arose. He stepped toward her, and noted with satisfaction how the confident anger soon melted from the young woman’s face. “Mrs. Zither, we’re examining the crime scene―which you seem intent on contaminating. You need to leave the way you came. Besides, there’s nothing you want to—”
She reached both hands to her mouth to stifle her shock.
Detective Harding placed a reassuring hand on her trembling shoulders, sinking his fingers into the tattered sweater, feeling the trembling of her shoulder. Couldn’t she afford a new sweater? That thing’s about had it. “I’m sorry. You don’t need to see this.”
She moaned into her hands, now pliant to the rookie’s guiding pulls toward the double-door entrance. “Who could have done this? It’s so … horrible!”
Harding watched Rodriguez usher the grieving widow out of the room. “Keep the room clear, Rodriguez! Crime team only.”
Harding placed his hands on his hips and surveyed the room again. He didn’t like it. Not one bit. It’s too … perfect. Too theatrical, too dramatic. Like a middle school stage play rather than the scene of an actual crime. Harding had examined dozens of murder scenes in his five years on the force, many more gruesome, a few more sterile, but he’d never before seen one so obvious. Whoever killed the Whiz Kid might as well have set up a neon sign flashing “Interrupted Random Burglary. Don’t look too closely.”
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Next: Inner Strength (A Rebecca Burton Short Story)