Arlo #3
“Well, maybe one day someone will tell you what your charm is in a way that makes it feel like a compliment,” he said with a laugh, scooting forward. “Anything good today?”
“Do I need to point out that most people frown on referring to a death or a body as ‘anything good’?”
“Most people don’t have their professional lives saturated in death and grieving. After a while, if you don’t find some humor, or make it, you’ll get as uptight as Elaine, or uh, as weird as you...no offense.”
“None taken,” I said with a shrug. It wasn’t as if I didn’t realize I was weird. “And humor when surrounded by dark things is a normal human response. I was just pointing out that if you do that around others, say...Elaine.”
“We both know I could sneeze funny around her and she’d hate me,” Mitchell said with a laugh. “But fine, I get the hint that I need to get out of your hair. I’ll leave you to work, I know you hate being distracted.”
“Order something for lunch,” I told him, grabbing my wallet from the drawer, sliding my card out, and handing it to him. “For all of us. Pick whatever, but let me know where you’re ordering from so I can choose.”
“You’re such a great boss,” he said with a grin, taking the card and sauntering off. “No matter what other people say.”
“The only thing people say about me is some variation of how weird I am and how cold I can be. They’re not talking about whether or not I’m good at my job, which I am...good try though.”
“One day, I’ll get you, I swear it.”
“I await the day.”
Mitchell chuckled as he walked out, and I listened for the sound of the hinges on the door, hearing the latch as he pulled, and then the sound of it closing.
I waited several heartbeats before I shook my head, sure he was gone.
I wouldn’t have put it past him to linger to make another attempt at startling me, but that was what the card and lunch were for.
He might be determined to get one over on me, but he was also easily distracted by the promise of food, particularly free food.
I could say I understood people well enough to manipulate them into giving me some peace now and then.
I turned back to the file before getting paper and a pen from one of the desks. There was plenty of technology I could use to get the job done, but something about manually writing notes and thoughts appealed to me.
Setting the pad down, I opened my phone and flipped through Spotify before settling on a playlist with a little bit of everything.
As much as I enjoyed quiet time, there was such a thing as too much quiet.
The music was background noise; I could block out the emptiness that filled the preparation rooms.
My eyes lingered on my phone for a moment before I shook my head, returned to the file, and began to look it over. It had been put together by Elaine and Mitchell, and I appreciated the work they put into it.
Elaine had put together the part that dealt with the damage done to the body and compiled the coroner’s report so I would know what physically needed to be addressed.
Mitchell had gone through the process of talking to what loved ones of the deceased could be reached and were willing to talk.
That way, we had a good idea what to include with the service, or at least to suggest to the people in charge of the arrangements.
Sometimes, even those in charge of setting things up were too frazzled with grief to think of the details, and having this kind of information made it easier for us to help them.
By all accounts, she was a normal woman.
Twenty-three years old, had graduated the year before from the local college with a double major in political science and sociology.
According to her family, she didn’t have a lot of friends, but she was apparently a friendly, outgoing girl from middle school onward.
I thought it was telling that she didn’t have close friends anymore, but I suppose I didn’t have much room to talk.
It wasn’t like I had many friends other than my siblings, and most people didn’t count sibling relationships.
She graduated with a 3.8 and became an aide to the mayor.
According to accounts from the rest of the office, she had also been perfectly ‘normal’ and friendly.
She’d lived by herself in a nice apartment in a decent part of the city, with a couple of cats, apparently citing that her two boys were all she needed when it came to love and dating.
She was a knitter, enjoying sitcoms from the nineties despite being young enough to have missed them at their peak.
She was apparently big on finding nature trails dotted around the city’s outskirts and exploring them.
Apparently, she was fond of bringing her cats with her on those excursions, equipped with leashes and harnesses and a specialized carrier that allowed her to put them into a backpack whenever the cats were tired or it was too dangerous for them.
By all accounts, Olivia Thorne was a successful, happy young woman making her first real steps in the world and putting her stamp on it. Until she wound up dead, shocking everyone by suddenly taking her own life.
A rhythmic but rapid tapping pulled me from my thoughts until I realized it was coming from me.
I frowned at the pencil as if it were somehow its fault when I couldn’t immediately figure out what had me so restless.
Nothing in the file was particularly distressing, nothing that reminded me of my own life beyond the distinct feeling of loneliness I got from her.
Perhaps that was what it was. No one else in her life seemed to have noticed her loneliness.
She was punctual, always showed up for birthday parties with a gift, always there when someone needed help or a shoulder to cry on.
Yet there wasn’t one person who claimed to be close to her.
But they clearly missed the woman who was missing something so dearly in her life that she—
My eyes fell on my phone, and my frown eased, a sigh slipping from me as I understood. I was exceptionally close to the truth. There had been nothing particularly upsetting about her file, but it was where thinking about her made my thoughts drift to...that was a different matter entirely.
I stared at my phone, brow wrinkling and irritated that I had broken my workflow. It wasn’t often that something was so distracting that I couldn’t lose myself in my work. Now I had something bubbling away in the back of my head, and it wouldn’t be ignored for long.
I wasn’t one to believe in fate or destiny, but I did notice that the universe had a certain degree of synchronicity, even coincidence.
Not just my thoughts, or this woman, but the fact that Mitchell had decided to ask me about my love life when it was a subject he didn’t usually bring up with me.
Yet he had, and now the subject was burned into my brain, leaving me wondering. ..curious—
Curious about the strange man with gray, almost sad eyes.
A man who had seemed bright, cheerful, and even a little uncaring about the world around him.
Yet I had sensed a deep well of sadness and loneliness in him.
He hadn’t been shy about mentioning how bored he was, and his constant need for something interesting to happen, good or bad, just so long as it was interesting.
It was, to some, the behavior of a bored, spoiled socialite who didn’t want to take responsibility for the consequences of his actions or had bought everything but meaning.
I suppose those things could be true, but I saw a man in constant battle with a devastating state of ennui.
So why was that intriguing to me? Why did it hold my attention?
I didn’t know. But there was only one way to find out.
With a sigh, I opened my contacts and scrolled, going down to W and staring at the name.
..and the green call button. There were several reasons I should call and at least talk to him.
He had intrigued me, different from what I was used to, and not at all what I expected to find that night.
And yet here I was, hesitant to call, knowing he couldn’t take the decision out of my hands and call me instead, as I was the only one with contact information.
So why was I so hesitant? Was it because we were that different?
Was it because I was worried? Worried about what?
There was nothing to worry about in a simple phone call.
It wasn’t as though he presented a real threat to me or offended me.
All he had done was...what? Show an interest in me?
Ask me out on a date? Sheesh, the man had even tried to be respectful just in case and backtracked enough to say that it didn’t have to be a date if I didn’t want it to be.
So, why the hesitation?
It was like trying to figure out why he was so enticing; all I could do was find out.
Boldness didn’t come easy, but I suppose I wasn’t being all that bold.
It was simply finding the courage to hit a button and call someone who had already taken the first steps.
God, if there was one thing I could trust myself to do, it was dial a number.
I apparently had to hit the button and panic as I figured out if I should go with the speaker or the regular phone microphone before it stopped ringing. I watched the call counter begin.
“Hello?” came his voice, and I fumbled with the phone, feeling my face warm as I remembered the sound quality would be terrible in this echoing room, and stuck the phone to my ear.
“Hello,” I said, thankful I had trained my voice to sound calm and in control when called for. “Ward?”
“I could check my ID, but I’m sure that’s who I am,” he said, and I couldn’t help but smile. One didn’t grow up with a family like mine without an appreciation for a dry, smartass sense of humor. Or at least, I hadn’t.