Paper Doll Dreams

“Manchego. That’s the secret,” Cobb declared.

“What the hell is Montego?” asked Brooks.

“Manchego. It’s a cheese. And it’s the secret to the world’s best grilled cheese sandwich.”

“Everybody knows grilled cheese is made with yellow cheese.”

“What kind of cheese?”

“You know. Yellow cheese.”

“Yellow is a color, not a cheese.”

“Sure it is. It’s cheese…that’s yellow.”

“I don’t care if it’s purple. You haven’t lived until you’ve had my grilled Manchego with honey butter. Honey butter is the secret.”

“I thought Montenegro was the secret.”

“Manchego.”

“Would you two shut the hell up?” Detective Laney Stevens griped as she approached. “It’s too goddamn early. What have we got?”

“Good morning to you too, sunshine,” her partner, Detective James Cobb greeted cheerily, handing her a paper cup with a plastic lid. “Black, two sugars. Late night?”

Stevens didn’t respond but took a sip and burned her tongue, so she wrapped both hands around it and let it warm her from the outside.

Cobb cleared his throat. “Possible abduction. Keys and phone under the car. Dog in the car.”

“Dog?”

“A mutt,” Cobb consulted the little notepad where he kept details about each case they worked. “Name of Beans, according to the tag.”

“No wallet,” Stevens mused. “Botched mugging, maybe. Who’s our vic?”

“Car’s registered to a Kelsey Turner, age thirty-six. Lives in the neighborhood. I’ve got uniforms there right now. Looks like nobody’s home.”

“Tell them no one goes inside until I get there. Who called it in?”

“A lady walking her dog.” Cobb gestured to an older woman in a pink ski jacket sitting on a bench holding a small dog on her lap. “Didn’t know the vic’s name, but she knew the dog. Says she saw the vic here last night, walking her dog. Says the car was parked in the same spot. Looks like it hasn’t moved since.”

“What time was that?”

Cobb glanced at his notes. “About eleven-thirty.”

“Damn late to be walking the dog in this cold.”

“According to our witness, it was pretty routine.”

She pulled on a pair of disposable latex gloves and ducked under the yellow police tape. The scene was just as her partner had described it. On the ground, beneath the driver’s side front door was a set of keys and a cell phone. She tried the door handle. Locked. She hunched down and carefully picked up the keys by the ring. There was a silver keychain with the words “Choose Happy” engraved on its face and several keys, including a remote car key. She pushed the unlock button. Nothing. She tried the lock button. Still nothing. Not the vic’s keys, then? She inserted the key in the lock and turned. The door unlocked. So, they were the vic’s keys. She dropped the keys into an evidence bag, sealed it, and stuffed it into the pocket of her coat. The phone went into its own bag. Phones weren’t much use for evidence anymore since they were almost always locked. It was nearly impossible to get one unlocked unless the victim was dead – and even then, there were no guarantees.

“You said something about a dog?” she called over to Cobb, who stood just outside the yellow tape talking with Sergeant Brooks.

“It was in the car when we got here. Passenger door was unlocked, so we got it out. Poor thing was freezing, so we put it in Brook’s patrol car to warm up.”

Stevens nodded as she inspected the rest of the car’s interior. It was surprisingly immaculate for having a dog spend the night in it. Her search turning up nothing out of the ordinary, she made her way around to the trunk, inserted the key in the lock, took a deep breath, and lifted the lid.

She exhaled. No body, at least. A couple of canvas tote bags, an emergency first-aid kit, and a long-handled ice scraper. She slammed the trunk.

“Let’s go check out the house,” she said.

“Apartment,” Cobb clarified. “Right around the corner. We could walk there.”

She indicated he should lead the way, and he waved down Sergeant Brooks to join them.

“If it’s so close, why’d she drive?” Stevens wondered aloud.

Cobb scratched the stubble along his jawline. “On her way home from somewhere else, maybe.”

“Or maybe she just didn’t like walking down this street in the dark,” Stevens muttered. There weren’t any sidewalks, and not much of a shoulder so they were walking in traffic lanes.

They rounded a corner and turned into a complex of nondescript, three-story apartment buildings, each surrounded by rows of parked cars. They located building seven and two uniformed police officers emerged from a patrol car as they approached.

“Third floor,” an officer said. “Nobody answered, and nobody’s gone in or out since we got here.”

They climbed the stairs to the third floor. There were four apartments per floor, and number nineteen was at the back and to the right. Cobb pounded on the door with his fist, waited a moment, then pounded again.

A door did open, but it was for the apartment next door. An older woman poked her head out and glared at them.

“Oh, it’s you,” she said as if she wasn’t at all pleased. She glared a moment longer, then she was gone. The deadbolt made an audible click.

Stevens fished the victim’s keys out of her pocket, took them out of their bag and tried each key in the lock. She got it on the second try. She pushed open the door and stepped into Kelsey Turner’s living room.

***

“Hey Stevens, you didn’t tell me you know the vic,” Cobb said, handing her a framed photograph.

“I don’t—” it was a picture of her with a tall, blonde woman, and they were smiling happily in front of a backdrop of snow-covered mountains. “I’ve never seen her before in my life,” Stevens said, referring to the blonde but studying her own face in the photo. It definitely looked like her, although she was fairly certain her face wasn’t capable of such an exuberant smile. And she never wore her hair down like that. It looked damn irritating. Laney preferred her much more pragmatic ponytail.

“Actually, you have,” Sergeant Brooks said from where he stood in the bedroom doorway holding a lady’s handbag in one gloved hand and a driver’s license in the other. He handed the license to Stevens.

There, printed in full-color next to the victim’s name, address, and date of birth, was Laney’s face.

“This is a joke, right?” But as she looked around the room, she saw her face reflected back at her again and again, except in each she was posing in scenes from someone else’s life. If they were pulling a prank on her, they had gone to an awful lot of trouble. “I want this authenticated. Get it over to Fraud ASAP and tell them I want a rush on it!”

Brooks took the license and ducked back out into the hall.

“What the hell is going on?” Stevens asked.

“Long lost twin?” Cobb answered with a shrug, and his partner wasn’t entirely sure he was joking.

***

Detective Stevens had barely set foot in the squad room when she was nearly taken down by a K-9 assailant. Beans seemed especially excited to see her, jumping up and generally slobbering all over her.

“I guess even the dog sees the resemblance,” Cobb quipped.

“Enough, down,” Stevens said firmly.

“Me or the mutt?”

“I’m putting in for a new partner,” Stevens muttered as she made her way to her desk, the dog on her heels.

“What is it doing here, Sergeant,” she asked Brooks.

“Pound’s full. We’re looking for a place that’ll take him,” Brooks told her. “I’ve called just about everywhere.”

“Why don’t you take him home with you, Bill,” Cobb offered. “I’m sure he’d love some of your yellow cheese.”

“I bet he’d prefer your Monte Carlo. You take him,” Brooks countered.

“Oh, no. Beth would leave me for good this time. How ‘bout you, Stevens?”

Stevens felt like she was playing a game of hot potato. And she was losing. She wracked her brain for an excuse, but her brain was too busy working out the paradox of her doppelganger to be of much help.

“Yeah,” Brooks jumped in. “Might be nice to have something to keep you warm at night.”

She shot him her best too far look, and he hung his head sheepishly.

“Seriously, though,” Cobb stepped in. “The dog seems to like you. And it’s just for one night. Besides,” he finished with a grin, “he’s our only witness to a potential kidnapping.”

“You just can’t help yourself, can you Cobb?” Stevens asked. “Fine, I’ll take the dog. But just for tonight. Brooks, keep looking for a shelter.”

***

“Beans, let’s go!” she gave a tug on the leash, but it did little to budge the determined dog at the other end. Nose to ground, intent on some smell, he ignored her. “Beans!” Another tug, equally ineffective. “I’m freezing my ass off.” She stomped her feet in her boots to get some circulation. How long could a dog sniff one spot? Too long. She hauled on the leash, and at last Beans relented, turning and plodding after her down the sidewalk toward the single puddle of light where her car waited. She fished in her left pocket with half-numb fingers for her keys, still tugging on the leash in her right hand each time Beans found some interesting new smell. Damn, wrong pocket. She reached around to her right pocket and finally came up with the keys. She got the key in the passenger side door lock and pulled open the door. Have to remember to replace the battery in the clicker, she reminded herself for the hundredth time.

Beans jumped obediently into the passenger seat, and she shut the door, then shuffled around to the other side. Damn, it was cold. By next winter, she would have a house with a yard, she promised herself. No more late-night dog walks in the dead of winter.

Her reflection peered back at her from the car window as she reached to unlock the door. She almost didn’t recognize herself. She looked…strange somehow. The keys fell from her nerveless fingers and jingled as they hit the ground. Beans gave a single, sharp bark of alarm–

***

Laney Stevens awoke with a start from the vivid dream. She’d dreamt about cases before, her subconscious mind assembling the pieces into a whole while she slept, but not like this. Not in the first-person. As if she herself was the victim. Of course, given the victim’s uncanny resemblance to her, was it that surprising? Patting Beans on the flank, she sat up and swung her legs out of bed. She doubted she could get back to sleep now.

Out in the living room, she took an old cigar box down from its place on the shelf, opened it, and removed a neatly rolled joint and a lighter. She slumped onto the sofa, put her feet on the coffee table, lit the joint, and took a long drag. She let her head sink into the cushion as she exhaled slowly.

It wasn’t long before Beans plodded in, looking confused until he saw her. He jumped up on the sofa without waiting for an invitation and laid his head in her lap. She gently stroked the fur between his ears. 

“What the hell is going on? Who is Kelsey Turner?” she asked the dog.

Beans did not respond.

Laney took in her surroundings. There was little evidence of the five years she’d spent in the cramped apartment – nothing on the drab, off-white walls, no photographs of her life, no mementos, nothing at all of Laney Stevens. A few pieces of furniture chosen for function rather than form, and a small TV. That’s it. Practical. Generic. One-dimensional. Like her life. A tissue paper façade: if you looked too closely, you’d see there was nothing underneath.

She checked the time. Just past ten.

“Wanna go for a ride, buddy?”

Beans jumped off the sofa and headed to the front door.

***

A short time later, Laney and Beans slumped into another sofa, this one in building seven, apartment nineteen. Kelsey Turner’s apartment. It couldn’t be more different from her own. This room was full of stuff. Besides the framed photographs of Kelsey’s adventures, there was artwork covering almost every inch of wall space, ranging from black and white photography to what appeared to be fingerpainting. The furniture was equally mismatched, much of it hand painted in bright, contrasting colors. The only unifying theme to the room appeared to be cacophony. Here was a life, Laney thought. No tissue paper here.

She reached into her coat pocket for the joint she’s brought, but her fingers found something else entirely. She pulled out the evidence bag with Kelsey Turner’s cell phone.

“Huh,” she said softly, dumping the phone out of the bag and into her hand. It started right up when she pressed the power button.

A small icon of a padlock appeared on the screen. Of course, it was locked. On a hunch, Laney held the phone in front of her face. Almost instantly, the little padlock sprang open, and the screen came to life, displaying row after row of app icons. Facial recognition.

“Huh,” she said again.

There were several text messages and almost a dozen missed calls, all within the last 24 hours and all from someone named Nina. Judging by her avatar, she was the tall blonde in the pictures with Kelsey Turner. And judging by the content of the messages, the two women had a relationship.

Suddenly the phone in Laney’s hand buzzed, and Nina’s smiling face appeared on the screen. Laney flinched so badly she nearly dropped the phone. Impulsively, the swiped to take the call.

“Hello,” her voice was steady, betraying none of the panic she felt inside.

“Oh good, you’re alive,” a woman’s voice said sardonically.

“Hi Nina.”

“Hi Nina? That’s it?” Nina took an audible breath and let it out. “Jesus, Kels,” her voice was softer now, full of concern. “I was worried sick. When did you get back?”

“Uh, just now?” Shit.

“Kels? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“It’s not nothing. I’m coming over.”

“No, I–”

“I’m leaving now. I’ll be there in ten minutes.” The call disconnected.

“Shit,” Laney said, out loud this time. She had to get out of here.

She shoved the phone back in her pocket and headed for the door. One hand on the doorknob, she turned and looked back at Beans, who was still sitting on the sofa but looking at her with his head cocked to one side, as if asking if he should come along.

“Let’s go, boy,” she called. He was by her side in an instant, and she snatched up the leash from the floor and hooked it to his collar.

Outside, Beans tried to stop and sniff, but Laney dragged him to the car. She knew he probably needed to go, but she couldn’t take the time now. Nina would be there any minute.

She turned the car left out of the apartment complex, then right at the next corner. She had to stop and think. She turned into a small parking lot and parked the car beneath a streetlamp. Beans whined.

“Ok, I’ll take you for a walk. A quick one.” Maybe the cold air would help clear her mind. Her thoughts were in turmoil, her memories of the past twenty-four hours seemed disjointed. Chaotic. The last thing she remembered clearly was…what?

They didn’t walk far, but it was dark away from the streetlamp. Laney was surprised when a figure approached – an older woman bundled in a bright pink ski jacket and trailed by a little fluffy dog in a matching pink jacket. Laney nodded, and the woman smiled but continued on her way. Probably anxious to finish the walk and get home where it was warm.

“Beans, let’s go.” she gave a tug on the leash in her hand, but Beans didn’t budge. Nose to the ground, he was intently sniffing a single spot. “Beans!” Another tug. “I’m freezing my ass off.” She stomped her feet in her boots to get some circulation. She hauled on the leash, and at last Beans turned and plodded after her toward the car. She fished in her left pocket with half-numb fingers for her keys. Damn, wrong pocket. She reached around to her right pocket and finally came up with the keys. She got the key in the passenger side door lock and pulled open the door. Have to remember to replace the battery in the clicker, she reminded herself for the hundredth time.

Beans jumped obediently into the passenger seat, and she shut the door, then shuffled around to the other side. By next winter, she would have a house with a yard, she promised herself. No more late-night dog walks in the dead of winter...