Snow Angel (Pt. 2)

***

I clicked off the television with no idea what show had just been on. I'd been staring at the idiot box for hours without taking anything in, just staring and thinking. It had been three weeks since we found the first one, the first “snow angel,” as the news stations were calling her. Saw that one coming from a mile away. Two per week for those three weeks, bringing the total to six. One on each Monday and one on each Thursday, like clockwork, though of course that's not when we found them. It was when C.S.I. pegged time of death, but they couldn't get any more than that. Two per week like clockwork, and all easy enough to find. Purposefully easy.

And today is Monday. It is nine o'clock P.M. and I am sitting alone in my apartment, staring at a blank T.V. with no idea where to go on the case, but expecting a phone call any minute from Carl, telling me in his dumb, inbred voice that they've pegged another “snow angel.” He loves that term.

Bastard.

Nine months we've peen partners, since he transferred in from Syracuse. Maybe they were tired of dealing with that blank stare, with watching his little gears click together as he looks at you with his mouth open. They had to be; he'd been there for three years before they passed him onto us, no explanation given and none coming from him. It'd been my bad luck to draw the short straw and get stuck with the new “'tard” on the detective team. Just my luck.

But I'm stopping myself from focusing on what's really bothering me, which is why we've gotten no where with this whole thing. Much easier to focus on my idiot partner than on the worst serial killer the city's ever seen. Hell, the worst serial killer the state's ever seen, and we're getting no where, even with this odd pattern the killer's giving us. It's like a dream scenario where we have so many ways to track him down, but none of them are working. None of them.

And even now, it's that first girl I can't get out of my head. The first girl, lying there, contorted like no body should ever be, her arms and legs flailed out like a kid making a snow angel, her blood soaking in to the fresh snow. That's the image I can't get out of my head. Jessica Matthews. Poor kid. Something just keeps nagging at the back of my mind, telling me she's different than the rest, than the others who followed.

And from Syracuse too, it turned out. Poor kid, that would've been enough for me to pity her, but still. But all the others too, all poor kids, from all around. All college students, but not all from the same one. Seems to be an equal-opportunity killer, ours, but always the same type, always in my city.

All the girls between 5' 2” and 5' 8”, and all blonde. All attractive. All white girls in college, that's what ties them together and you think it'd give us something to go on, but nothing. I've heard on CNN that girls matching the description all over the tri-state area are staying home from school. Must be nice to get a break like that, even if out of fear for your life.

And then the phone rings.

“Hey boss, I know you're off the clock, but I know you said you wanted to know when we found the next one. . . Well, we have.”

I notice how he calls it “the next one.” Of course, we've all been saying that for the last two weeks like we're talking about the sun rising or the Mets missing another World Series. The next one, like clockwork. “Yeah, where is it this time?”

***

When I get there, Carl's already waiting for me. Even he's looking a little the worse for wear these days and I can see his big blank eyes are a little blood shot, even when they're staring at me like lost puppy. Must be a hell of a killer to make a moron like him care. “What's the story?”

He looks at me and I know that his little gears are turning, trying to put together the words. I can practically see them locking and twisting in his skull, computing the math. “Same as always, Ceeze. Dead girl in the snow.”

His brows furrow at least when he says it, so maybe he does have some remorse at having to see all these broken bodies, but I have to focus on the scene. No matter how much I hate to, after this many.

It's another one, this time behind the dorms, sprawled out in the still falling snow by a dumpster, like the killer couldn't be bothered to throw her in. Carl says she was found by a couple of college kids who were necking in the alley between the buildings. Ran screaming without damaging the scene, thank god. But it's blood everywhere, again. A young, short blond, again. The same thing every time, with me and Carl standing over it. “Gee Ceeze, you'd think he'd run out of girls like that after a while, huh?”

I spin from the horrid scene before me and look at Carl, hard. “That's...”

But I see his lip shaking and realize there was a quaver in his voice when he said it. It's getting to him, seeing this again and again. Must be hard, guy his age, seeing all this. Seeing all these kids, same age as him, dying so painfully. Still in school, like he could've been if he wasn't just some dumb cop. I swear he's trying hard not to cry out of those wide eyes of his. I can't help but feel for him, and that says a lot. “Hey man, why don't you back off of this case, eh? We aren't making any progress and you've been working as much over time as me on this thing. Why don't you go home, yeah?”

“Nah Ceeze, I'm fine.” There's definitely a tear running down his cheek. I can see it even with the snow falling between us, leaving us both with a smooth sheen of white on our black uniforms. A distinct shade of grey.

“Really...” I put my hand on his shoulder, the first time I've ever touched him aside from the hand shake when we met and they said he was my new partner. I realize that as much as I've been making fun of this poor fool in my head, all the while he's a person just like me, and at least as shook up by all this. And the tears are flowing more freely now down his cheeks, leaving little lines in the snowflakes falling on his red cheeks. He's crying and sniffling at me. Great. “It's alright man, it's alright. I understand.”

“I know.” His eyes are hard for a second, harder than I've ever seen them. Maybe he's manning up and maybe I'll be able to go home without having to hug him. God willing. “I know you understand, Ceeze. I know.”

And I feel the barrel of his service pistol in my stomach, and I notice that his was the only car on this scene when I got here. And suddenly I do understand.