Cracked Lives: Cracked Cases Part 2

Author's Note: This story is a sequel to my other piece "Cracked Cases" (which, fun fact, was never intended to be a sequel but I ended up liking the characters enough to add on to their story). I can't actually tell you what to do but I would highly recommend that you read that one first, because this one won't make much sense without it.

        “Abigail!” Alma cried. “Abigail, please, what did my parents ever do to you?”

        “Absolutely nothing,” Abigail retorted, the picture of stoicism, “and neither have you.”

        Alma breathed gratefully as Abigail giggled. She loved letting Alma think she had won.

        “On the contrary,” Abigail continued, “you haven’t done quite enough.”

        “What?” Alma shrieked. “Abigail, you can’t hardly blame me! Do you know how hard it is to come up with murders?”

        “And do you know how hard it is to deal with you?” Abigail smirked at Alma’s furrowed brow. “Exactly.”

        They continued on for a few blocks, Abigail marching commandingly and confidently with Alma scurrying behind, protesting the entire way. Abigail mostly blocked it out. It was as if she had installed a filter in her brain that automatically ignored anything including the words, “please,” “parents,” or “no.”

        Up they hurried to the local police station, which had once been a factory, and then a school, and was now dilapidated with dusty, weathering bricks and iron bars over the windows. There was also a large sign on the front door that said “Please Knock Unless There’s an Emergency.”

        Abigail had little time for knocking. She busted on in.

        “Whatdoyouwant?” the very short man at the front desk mumbled, not looking up from his copy of the newspaper from three weeks ago and munching on a croissant. A croissant at eleven at night? Abigail made a mental note of that. She had only ever heard of croissants in the morning. This man must be hiding something.

        “I’m here to report a-“ Abigail couldn’t finish her sentence because three others began talking all at once.

        Alma begged, literally clasped her hands in front of her and plopped down on the floor, for Abigail to not deport her parents. If Alma had been focusing on the setting, she would have seen that she was the only one bringing up her parents, because the front desk man proclaimed that he had seen Abigail on the ten o’clock news and did not like her at all because she took business away from the police station. Both, however, were overwhelmed by a different man, this one marginally taller than the front desk man—but still shorter than Alma, who herself wasn’t the picture of height—wrapped like a burrito in a thick coat with a scarf over his head, shouting something about a doctor.

        It sounded like he was saying “Mmm mmm doctor!” because with every vocal movement wooly fibers crowded his mouth, but eventually Abigail could make out “You’re the doctor!”

        “No I’m not,” Abigail stated.

        The man looked at her quizzically. “But I need a doctor!”

        Abigail shrugged. “Okay.” She wasn’t sure what he wanted her to do with that information. There was a landline phone right at the desk if he so wished to make a call!

        Alma brightened, ever the eager face of helping. “I…actually, I don’t have a cellphone.” Abigail sighed.

        “But I really need a doctor!” the man insisted once again.

        “That’s wonderful. I need to file a police report,” Abigail retorted.

        “And I need my parents to stay!” Alma added.

        “And I need you all to get out of my office.” The short man stood up, his knees popping, and grabbed a spare broom propped up next to his desk. “Go on! Shoo! Especially you, detective!” He narrowed his eyes. “If that’s even your real name.”

        It wasn’t, and if he had truly been paying attention to the news, he would have known that it was Abigail Hartford.

        At the speed the man was going Abigail probably could have conducted another United News interview before he reached them with the broom, but nonetheless she left. With the bundled man unfortunately following her.

        Once outside Abigail leaned against the dusty brick—thank goodness her coat was red, so it wouldn’t be obviously stained—and rubbed her forehead with the palm of her hand. How could a police station just kick her out? She hadn’t been removing any of their business because, if they had been paying attention, she only took cases that had not yet been reported since she had taught Alma to never report her murders to the police. Police know when something is a murder versus a suicide versus an assault. Abigail did not need that knowledge messing with her narrative.

        She knew that the more efficient path would be to just call an emergency number and report the Martìnez family of illegal immigrants, but a tiny worm of a thought in the back of her brain stopped her. She didn’t really want to get them deported. She just wanted to scare Alma. Alma had been scared. She looked at the young girl, politely chatting with the bundled-up man, and decided to give Alma another chance. If Alma could commit a valid murder within the next week, Abigail would pretend she hadn’t heard about their little boating trip.

        But what to do about the man?

        “Listen up, Mister,” Abigail commanded briskly, “if you need a doctor, call an ambulance. We are not that doctor.”

        “Are you two related?” The strip of the man’s forehead that could be seen looked waxy in the station’s overhead lamp, which swayed on top of the door like they were all in an interrogation room.

        “No, business partners,” Abigail corrected at the same time that Alma enthusiastically exclaimed, “Yes!” Abigail pushed herself off the wall and raised one eyebrow at Alma, whose face shone golden in the lamplight. Alma looked back up at Abigail and smiled slightly and tight-lipped, the universal signal for “I’ve got a plan but can’t tell you about it just yet.” Abigail was fond of that smile: typically it meant a new murder was on the horizon.

        “Yes, I’m her aunt.” Abigail cleared her throat.

        The man’s whole face light up, making him look more like the moon then a wax figure, and he shook both of their hands enthusiastically. “Oh, thank goodness, thank goodness! You’ve probably got some old recipes in your family’s history! Listen, I need some help, help for my brain.”

        Abigail nodded, focusing more on Alma whose ears were perked up like a hunting dog ready to pounce. Abigail herself would have dumped the man half an hour ago, but clearly Alma thought this was leading somewhere.

        “I seem to have lost my memory,” the man continued. Oh really, was that all he had lost? Abigail doubted it. “I mean, it’s more like it was rearranged. I can’t remember anything from more than a day ago, but I can see into the future.”

        “Oh really?” Abigail couldn’t help herself. “Tell me who wins this year’s election.”

        “Um…” the man leaned back and rolled his head up, “Frond. Harriet Frond.”

        “She’s not even running!” Abigail placed a firm hand on Alma and prepared to steer her away from the con artist.

        “No, no, not like that,” the man corrected, straightening up. “Alexander Jeff is going to win then he’s going resign along with half his cabinet, so Harriet Frond will be the only one left. It’s going to be a weird year for politics.”

        Abigail still didn’t entirely believe him, and her grip on Alma’s shoulder tightened. “Well, then, tell me what color barrette I’ll be wearing in a week.”

        That ought to trick him because she only wore headbands.

        “Not like that either!” The man waved both hands in an x-shape. “I can’t see into the future, per say, I can’t look into every little detail like a camera lens. It’s like asking you to remember your entire past; I can only remember large events or specifics important to me. But into the future, not the past.”

        “And do you remember how you die?” Alma spoke so innocently and off-hand it wouldn’t have sounded any stranger then if she had asked the man to go out for a picnic. The man himself seemed only slightly confused before leaning back and rolling his head up. “Let me see…” This seemed to pose a challenge; his eyes flicked back and forth as if he was watching the future change right in front of him. That must have been exactly what he watched because after straightening out he breathed in sharply and pointed a shaky hand at Alma.

        “Really, mister?” Abigail stepped in. “You’d think that my lovely niece would kill you?” Abigail looked at Alma and the two chuckled lightly.

        “But-but the girl looks exactly like you!” The man’s whole arm had taken to trembling.

        “Lamplight does strange things,” Alma shrugged. Then she stepped one pace closer to the man. “And do you really think I’d really kill you?”

        The man didn’t even respond. He just bolted away.

        “That wasn’t terrible.” Abigail patted Alma’s shoulder, but inside she was beaming. They had just identified their next victim! “I might consider not telling your parents. But there’s still two more things I want you to do.”

        “I figured as much.” Alma wriggled out from underneath Abigail’s firm hand. “Though first we should leave this area. There are probably security cameras around.”

        New York City always seems much smaller when one is excited, Abigail realized. She wouldn’t let Alma see just how excited she was, because then Alma’s excitable brain would think she enjoyed spending time with her, but she certainly wasn’t as irked as before. Within what felt like just a few minutes they had arrived in a very twisty, dusty, back alley somewhere. Abigail never learned the names of such alleys in the event she was captured and tortured for information—she couldn’t tell anything she didn’t know.

        “We should go to your house, one day,” Alma suggested when there were settled, leaning against opposite walls of the alley.

        “Yes, and I’m sure the television journalists would see us enter together and would have a field day with the speculations. I’ll take you once I’m retired.” Abigail knew that would be never. “So, what’s your plan?”

        Alma grinned gleefully—it probably was intended to be a smirk but Alma’s youthful, springy self just couldn’t pull something so outwardly-devious off—and rubbed her hands together. “Do you want me to be like you?”

        “No; then there’s two of me and, as practical as that would be, if I wanted that I would have cloned myself already.”

        Alma didn’t listen. “Well, I’m not going to tell you-“

        “Must I remind you of your familial situation the last time you didn’t tell me something?”

        “But this time’s different!” Alma stopped the rubbing and flung her hands to her side, already exasperated at attempting to deliver any element of suspense. “This time I don’t have blackmail. This time I have a plan that you’ll like!”

        Abigail shook her head slightly. “Alright. I truly hope you understand how much trust you are requiring of me.”

        “I know!” Alma chirped brightly. “And I’ll get back to you in two days!”

        They were two very long, dull, empty two days. Thanks to Alma’s prior “blackmail” Abigail had to spend the bulk of the time spinning some tale about Lilly Lowell and how she had swallowed poisonous bath-bomb chemicals after falling asleep in the tub. It was a stretch considering that the autopsy showed that Lilly had died in one of her stores but Abigail had deftly taken that autopsy and was currently the only one holding the contradictory evidence.

        Abigail wasn’t a very easy sleeper—her parents insisted it was because she was plagued with nightmares resulting from her scary and spontaneous profession but Abigail argued that it couldn’t be nightmares if she had never fallen asleep in the first place. Instead, Abigail often simply sat in a chair with the lights off and closed her eyes and listened to her brain rattle off all sorts of monologues until she opened her eyes in tune to the rising sun. Abigail realized how pretentious it sounded to say that her “brain never shut off” but it wasn’t that she always had intelligent conversations with herself—once she spent a whole night wondering if a blobfish named Bob would be called a Bobfish.

        At the dusk of the second day Abigail barely slept at all. Where was Alma and why had she not delivered on her promise? Abigail paced around her living room, across each other walls, tracing one finger along the weathered wallpaper, wondering what her next course of action would be. Would she go to Alma’s house or the police station? The latter would probably be more effective.

        “Abigail?” a tinny voice called out from behind her. Abigail didn’t need to turn around to know who it was. So that's why Alma was so eager to see her house: she already knew the address.

        Alma was late but that was better than never, Abigail supposed.

        “Abigail?” Alma repeated. “Abigail, I would really appreciate it if you stopped ignoring me.”

        Abigail breathed in deeply and whirled around to be greeted with Alma and a bloody knife.

        Abigail didn’t need a mirror to know that her eyes were probably shining. “Alma, thank goodness you finally did it!”

        “I know,” Alma whimpered, sticking the knife out far away from her.

        “How?” Abigail gasped, not sure whether to jump up and down or immediately being preparing her press reports.

        “The old-fashioned way.” Alma eyed the knife as if at any moment it would spin around and stab her. “I wasn’t lying when I said I’m out of ideas.”

        “Show me the body,” Abigail instructed. “And tell me everything on the way.”

        The night-time temperatures had been steadily decreasing as the winter crept closer and Abigail made a mental note to take her other, slightly-warmer maroon coat out of the basement closet, where she exiled most of her heavy clothes. As Alma chattered her words condensed into little puffs that floated up to the heavens like baby clouds. Abigail figured Alma would be the type of person to think that baby clouds grew into large clouds like some sort of a dilapidated cloud-family.

        “So,” Alma summarized, “I waited for the man to forget about me, which technically could have been after one day, but I wanted to guarantee it, and then I crept up to him and stabbed him.” She had repeated the procedure so many times to so many others under Abigail’s watch that her voice had lost any sense of pride.

        They rounded a corner to yet another dark alley. “It wasn’t hard because the man didn’t have a home to break into or anything.” Alma pointed weakly ahead. “He’s right there.”

        Abigail hurried over to the body. He was, in fact, homeless, judging by the way he was huddled up against the wall with the same exact clothes as two days before; his hat and scarf had been knocked off and Abigail could see scraggly hair and a stubbly beard that had been shaved recently but not recent enough. So he had lost all of his wealth recently. Drug overdose? Alcohol? Natural disaster? Wayward love affair? Abigail poked the body, ensuring it was cold and limp. The man's eyelids were pasted shut, his skin papery, and his hollow veins protruding out like infected tree roots. A stream of blood had seeped through the threadbare clothes on his chest and was pooling below him, soaking into the mossy, weedy asphalt.

        The possibilities were endless and Abigail could make up a very intriguing story out of them all.

        Abigail stood back up. “Good job, Alma. This man is most definitely dead.” She kicked the body to the side. “Let’s bring him to the hospital and collect the autopsy report.”

        “Wait!” Alma scampered over and picked up a small brochure-sized file that must have fallen out of the man’s pocket in the kick.

        Abigail peered over her shoulder. “Langston Family Reunion,” followed by a date and a time. A date and a time that was conveniently in an accessible week.

        “Pack your bags, Alma.” Abigail crossed her arms and swept back down the alley.

        “Really?” Alma asked dubiously. “I’ve already murdered this man. Don’t you think we’ve cracked enough lives?”

        Abigail giggled softly to herself. “Of course not, Alma. We’ve got a family reunion to get to.”