Total pages in book: 120
Estimated words: 111860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 559(@200wpm)___ 447(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 111860 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 559(@200wpm)___ 447(@250wpm)___ 373(@300wpm)
“No one’s going to ticket you, Mr. Cheng.” People like him were few and far between. The people living hand to mouth in this community were lucky to receive his kindness. “So you went to the tents up the block? To see if anyone inside wanted some food?”
“No. There was a man sleeping on a bench near the tent. No shoes. No coat. I set one of the sandwiches next to him so he would find it when he woke up. That’s when I saw the blood.”
Dammit. So there was blood. The lieutenant hadn’t mentioned blood. A small cramp knotted in her lower stomach.
“So I thought maybe someone is hurt,” Mr. Cheng went on, “needs medical care. I used my phone flashlight and pushed the flap aside. It was partway open already. And I see the two . . . dead. I can tell they’re dead. Still. One had his eyes open.” He gave a small shiver. “Drugs on the ground. It’s always drugs.”
“Okay, Mr. Cheng. Thank you for calling us. Will you be here for a little bit in case I have any more questions?”
“Yes, I will be here.”
Lennon thanked him and left the store, taking gloves from her pocket. She started to head down the block toward the tents, and one of the officers called out, “Do you want one of us to come with you?” She did. She really did. In fact, she didn’t want to check inside that tent at all. Not now, not in the dark, but also not in the light. She wanted to stand behind one of those officers as he checked, and it made her feel pitiful and unworthy of the badge she carried. She should have gone home and changed after she got the call, not only to stall but because right now she felt about as capable as Workout Barbie walking toward a double homicide, and she was dressed the part.
“No, it’s okay,” she said to the officer. “I’ll check it out and be right back.” She pulled the gloves on slowly as she made the walk. The people who’d placed their tents in the spot they had up ahead had likely done it because there wasn’t a streetlight too close by. They wouldn’t be kept awake by a bright light shining in their makeshift home, and if they were engaging in activities that they’d rather not advertise, then that worked in their favor too.
A car backfired up the street. In the quiet of the morning, it startled Lennon, and she gave a small jump. Great. Just what she needed to feel even more on edge.
She walked slowly toward the small grouping of tents, past the first and second, where she saw vague shadows moving on the nylon fabric. The morning was still dim, and the streetlight the officers were standing under, along with their flashing lights, were swallowed up by the fog, and so it gave the impression that the shifting light might be coming from apparitions inside. She’d been told they were unoccupied, but even so, a shiver went down her spine and the tiny hairs on her arms stood up.
The bench where Mr. Cheng had said a man was sleeping, was now empty. She stepped over a pile of vomit mixed with blood right next to the tent. That must be what Mr. Cheng was referring to and why the cops hadn’t mentioned it. Rather than alert them to a homicide, it lent further evidence to an overdose.
The officers who’d looked inside the yellow tent hadn’t propped the flap, and so the opening was closed now. She removed her phone and turned on the flashlight before she stepped up to the tent, turning her head slightly and bracing as she used her thumb and index finger to grasp the very edge of the flap and gingerly pull it aside. A sound of disgust moved up her throat, and the officers were far enough away that she allowed it to escape, holding her breath against the smell that hit her in the face, a combination of the dirty bodies that had been living in this small fabric space for a long while mixed with putrid bodily fluids that had obviously been marinating for at least several hours.
Breathe, just breathe.
One man was on his side, eyes open like Mr. Cheng had said, mouth ajar, a trail of bloody vomit leading from his lips and pooled in another gelatinous, lumpy mess on the floor of the tent. The other man was on the opposite side, turned away so that Lennon couldn’t see his face.
Her eyes moved over the piles of clothing and what looked like a stack of government forms, brochures, and other paperwork. She caught the VA logo on a piece of paper peeking out from the bottom and assumed one of the deceased was a military veteran, as so many homeless were. It was one of the statistics she hated the most. They’d sacrificed so much for their country and then been—literally, in some cases—kicked to the curb. There were shoes and liquor bottles and a mostly eaten loaf of bread, and just like the officers had told her, there were pills scattered here and there.