Lost Sleep

Jan. 10th, 2016 11:07 pm
brian_campo: (roof)
[personal profile] brian_campo posting in [community profile] hauntedbostonrpg
At 2:59 a.m., a text had arrived and it simply read: “01/08/16. Shooting. Female victim. 700 Block of Washington Street. No leads.”

The message came from a burner phone, but Brian, thick with sleep and thirst, knew that it was Detective Wilt Shipman, who didn’t give a shit if the ordinary men of the world were drooling into pillows or fucking pretty girls or what. When he wanted information, he was relentless, like a drill bit to the skull. If Wilt acted according to pattern, one ignored text led to a call, which led to a fist on the door, and finally an unmarked police car blaring its horn on the street. The dude was a prick. Brian attempted to cut him off at the pass with a return text - “she’ll still be dead at 8 a.m.”, but wisdom prevailed. At this hour, no one would see him skulking around the crime scene, which was probably Wilt’s line of thinking.

In the amber haze of a dirty streetlamp, he put on jeans and laced into his boots. He reclaimed an only vaguely dirty Ramones t-shirt from the hamper and topped it with a wool coat. His hair was still plastered to his forehead when he left the house. His old van grumbled and a fan belt squealed. The van was a holdover from his twenties when he needed it to haul gear for his band, back before responsibilities like child support and a mortgage payment. He plugged his phone into the stereo (definitely not factory) and picked through a playlist. Once he found a good song, he wiped his dry eyes and threw the transmission into reverse.

He stopped only once, for cigarettes, between his driveway and the address. He double-checked it. As far as murders went, it was an odd place to pick. Residential, historic neighborhood, cars with no body damage, American flags proudly swaying on front porches. The yellow tape, strung between the corner of a slumping garage and a cluster of trees, stuck out like a sore thumb; during another month, it would’ve been mistaken for a cheap Halloween decoration.

Wilt knuckle-tapped on the window. “I wish you’d lose this hunk of junk,” he said through the crack. The detective peered into the interior. “People probably think you’re hauling sex trafficking victims.”

“I bet the money’s better.” Brian got out and shut the door. On the way to the plot of grass, he killed his cigarette. “What am I looking for?”

“Bullet hole in the side of the garage,” called the detective, who gestured with a single cup of coffee.

Asshole.

Brian watched him head back to the street and then ducked under the tape. His palms, closed tight in their coat pockets, held an anticipatory tingle. They had been weapons in his thirty-two years of life, tricky digits designed to receive tactile information -- soft, rough, cold, wet -- but which supplied him with untold other details. The deep history of places. The secrets of people. The banal didn’t leave much of an imprint. It was the meat of life, the love and the hate and the greed, that turned an ephemeral thing like memory into a sort of fingerprint… psychic energy pressed onto three-dimensional objects.

He found the hole in the vinyl siding. His hand hovered. It was a risk. Sometimes he got more than he bargained for. A knife that sliced a stranger’s flesh cut Brian, too, in a different way. He had once lost an entire month of good sleep over a noise and a vivid mental picture (red bubbles expanding and popping in a throat). There were other, less violent ones. Powerful ones, like the treachery of his mother’s unlaundered sheets, and the last moments of his father’s life, which he spent clutching his chest inside the vinyl cape of a wet shower curtain.

What would he see this time? Was it worth whatever cash Wilt threw his way in order to improve his ratio of solved cases?

Brian shut his eyes and traced the shape of the bullet hole.

God, he hoped so.

Re: Lost Sleep

Date: 2016-01-27 05:14 am (UTC)
melodymagic: (Orange - 2)
From: [personal profile] melodymagic
"What?"

Well that was a little silly. He saw it all!

"That?" She stared at the dashboard for a moment, then down at her hands and back to him.

"Figured you didn't want me making a sticky mess on your dash?" she said, the question that had been bouncing around in her head about his being a murderer itching a little at the back of her brain. She rubbed her hands together, her palm a little itchy as it was sometimes afterwards.

She could see that he wasn't really angry-freaked or scared-freaked or thinking she was a freak, all expressions she had seen on the faces of people who'd seen something similar over the years. No, more curious-freaked she thought as she took a deep breath.

"I can move stuff, do things like that, and other things," she said, deciding this was a time to be honest instead of trying to hide it with humour, and act dumb.

"Can I have my hot chocolate back?" she added.

Re: Lost Sleep

Date: 2016-01-27 05:36 am (UTC)
melodymagic: (Close)
From: [personal profile] melodymagic
"It's OK, I'm selective in my recollections," she said simply, taking a sip from the uncontaminated beverage before looking at him again. "Just the hot chocolate," she told him, settling back into her seat as she watched him. His reaction was a little different to any other she'd experienced, and she could see he wasn't about to call her names, or run screaming from the van. She'd had that happen once, the guy had left his own car, keys and all, and bolted, and she'd had to drive it back to his place and leave it there for him.

"You're not freaked out by it," she said, head angled a little as she watched him. "Why not? That's the usual reaction I get when I accidentally slip." She took another sip as she waited for his answer.

Re: Lost Sleep

Date: 2016-01-28 12:42 am (UTC)
melodymagic: (Default)
From: [personal profile] melodymagic
At first Mel just looked at him, waiting for the punchline, or the smirk and line something like, "and pigs can fly!" But it didn't happen.

"You're serious," she said, fingers falling still where they had been picking at the slightly torn edge of the lid of the cup. "That's what you were doing, when I was standing there, you were seeing someone shoot that woman." It was said as a statement, not a question, as she had already skyrocketed past the obvious answer and started wondering what else he could 'see'. "Could you see who did it? Or do you see only one point of view, or are you the bullet? What did you see?" Deflection came naturally to her as she had had to do it for a long time.

"And who was the guy in the car?"

Re: Lost Sleep

Date: 2016-01-30 01:40 am (UTC)
melodymagic: (Default)
From: [personal profile] melodymagic
As she digested the information Mel directed him to take the two turns required that took them back to the Monroe's where her car was parked. The house was in darkness, the three other cars belonging to guests who were sound asleep inside too standing testament to her having carefully hidden their keys from their owners' sight, but in a location they would easily find in the morning - next to the coffee maker.

"So what did you see there? At that house? Was there anything that might help figure out what happened, and who shot the woman?" she asked, her curiosity piqued in both the event, and his abilities.

Re: Lost Sleep

Date: 2016-01-30 04:56 am (UTC)
melodymagic: (Default)
From: [personal profile] melodymagic
His silence reminded her it was no longer late, it was getting toward early, and she reached for the door handle. "Kinda?" She laughed softly as she shook her head. It was the first time she'd met someone who wasn't freaked, and now she knew why. "There's nothing 'kinda' about being able to see stuff that happened," she told him. There were so many more questions she had, such as if things just came to him when he brushed past, or touched someone, or if he was somewhere he didn't know anything about and it happened.

But she didn't want to overdo it. "Thanks for the ride."

Re: Lost Sleep

Date: 2016-01-31 01:30 am (UTC)
melodymagic: (Default)
From: [personal profile] melodymagic
It an odd feeling, like a wave of relief and something a little extra, probably excitement given his abilities, that Mel felt as she took the proffered card and looked at it. Shoving her hot chocolate into the same hand as his card she quickly reached into her back pocket and pulled out one of the few she had left after the Monroe's event and held it out to him. Her mother had drilled it into them from their first waiting gigs at her events, never go without cards because the best form of advertising was at those events, and the best way of making the right impression was to have a decent card to hand to the guest inquiring as to how to book them.

BEST WAI Catering, with her own name and cellphone number at the bottom, the company's details in the middle, with the other side listing the types of events they specialised in.

"That's my number at the bottom," she pointed out as she handed it to him.

Re: Lost Sleep

Date: 2016-01-31 02:48 am (UTC)
melodymagic: (Default)
From: [personal profile] melodymagic
Mel never wore jewelry when working, one of her mother's strict rules. It was all sitting at home on her dresser.

"Nice to meet you too, Brian," she replied, shaking his hand and smiling. "And thanks for the ride," she added letting his hand go and heading around the back of the van to grab the fuel. "Good luck with the case too."

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