Murda (Dead)

Without me really realizing it we made to the parking lot of the airport and they all pushed me into the middle. I still couldn’t stop shaking and felt like I was going to freeze. Caleb sat up front with Jack with Alex in the very back and me in the middle with Katie and Merry on either side. Once we got on the road, everyone fell into silence lost in their own thoughts. I was just getting the feeling that they were holding something back when I noticed that we weren’t heading in the direction of my house or Alex’s.
“Where are we going” I asked

I saw Jack and Caleb glance at each other but they didn’t say anything. I looked at Merry and then at Katie and could tell that they were hiding something.

“What are you not telling me? Where the hell are we going?” I asked again, getting scared and angry

No one said anything for a moment and then Caleb cleared his throat. “You know how Kevin’s parents are on that African Safari? Well the cops have reached them by phone and told them what’s happened but they won’t be able to get here for another two days. Since you are listed as his primary emergency contact, the cops need you to officially ID his body”

As Caleb’s words and their meanings sank in, I felt like throwing up. “You mean that no one’s ID’d his body yet? It took me 7 hours to get here and no one’s ID’d him yet? And that I have to do it? I have to see him…him…him” and I lost it. Sobs shook my body as the full impact of what I was about to do and see set in.

I felt Alex’s hand on my shoulders and Katie and Merry’s arms enveloped me. The rest of the drive was spent in silence and after what seemed like moments we pulled up to the police station which was attached to the coroner’s office.

We all trooped inside the police station and walked up to the front desk. Seeing that I wasn’t saying anything Jack stepped up to the lady and said “hi. Um we are here to identify a body?”

The lady whose name I saw was Officer Kendrick gave Jack an odd look before asking “How do you know that?”

Jack explained to her who we were here to identify and who I was. She checked my ID and then asked me to come with here. I asked her if I could take someone with me and looked like she was about to say no. She must have seen the condition I was in and hesitating for a moment, nodded yes. Alex and Jack both stepped forward but I didn’t feel like facing Alex at the moment and grabbed Jack’s hand. Officer Kendrick, Jack and I silently walked down a long hallway and finally emerged into a room.

I don’t know what I had been expected a coroner’s office to look like but the reality still surprised me. It was all white and shinning silver. Everything looked sterile and it was cold in the room. I started shivering again and felt Jack’s arms around me and held me close to him. The officer told to the person in the room we were here for an id and she led us into a smaller room. Jack and I waited outside the room for a few minutes and when she asked us to enter there was a body laying in the middle of the room, covered up.

Hugging my arms tightly around me I stepped forward and the lady pulled back the covering. At first I stood there in shock just staring at the body. I opened my mouth to try and say something but couldn’t. The lady must have thought that that meant that the body wasn’t Kevin’s and said “sorry about that. We must have gotten the ID wrong”

“No” I finally was able to say. “No. No that’s Kevin. Oh my god that’s Kevin. Kevin’s dead. Kevin’s gone” I started getting hysterical and each word was louder than the last.

My mind had run through a million scenarios of what Kevin could possibly look like but the reality was far different. There was blood all over his clothes still and I could see the wounds on this head that had probably killed him. There were bruises all over his face and what I could see of his chest. The most surprising thing of all way how alive he still looked. Like he would get up any second and say “gotcha”.

I started hyperventilating and along with the sobbing, I quickly passed out. I opened my eyes to find that I was lying on a couch and someone was shining a light into my eyes. I groaned and the doctor, who strangely reminded me of Ducky the coroner form NCIS, smiled and said to someone I couldn’t see “she’s fine. Just the stress and upheaval of having to ID a body of someone she very obviously loved.

After much protesting that I was fine they finally let me get off the couch. The doctor turned to Jack and Alex and told them to keep a close eye on me and make sure I rested. As we were leaving, we had to go through the police station again. Officer Kendrick was still at the front desk and when she saw us she said “wait. Could you all please hold on a minute”?

We were all a little confused and all I could think was “please God. No more bad news”.

A minute later she came back outside and was quickly followed by an older man. He stuck his hand out to me and said “I’m Detective Green; I’m in charge of this case”

We all introduced ourselves and he asked us to follow him to a small office. Once we were all inside he turned to look at us with a serious look on his face. “We found the driver and the car that hit Mr. Kevin Campbell”

His announcement was met with sighs of relief from us all but as I looked at his face I knew there was more.

“What aren’t you telling us Detective Green?” I asked

He looked at me in surprise and said “The driver is a Mr.” he took a small notepad out of his pocket and looked at it “A Mr. John Knee. When we found him and the car at a bar downtown, it was quite apparent that Mr. Knee was intoxicated”

His announcement was met with looks of shock from us all and complete and total silence. Finally a hysterical sounding laugh escaped me.

Everyone turned to stare at me and I said “so some guy got drunk in the middle of a Thursday afternoon, decided to drive somewhere, hit and killed my best friend, ran from the accident and then went back to a fucking bar. He didn’t even have the fucking brain cells to go home”.

They continued to stare at me as I started laughing and couldn’t stop…