Ron Furnower drove his ancient red Jeep Wagoneer down Maple Street on the way to his office and he was already getting a headache. The only thing he dreaded more than the drive was pulling into the parking lot that was shared by four other businesses in the dirty little strip mall. There weren't enough spaces for all of the employees, let alone any customers that might accidentally wander in.
His office was officially in the seedy part of Washaw City, which was officially the seedy part of this quarter of the state. It was made up of about two miles of Highway 82, leading into or out of town, depending which way you were facing. It was originally an expansion of a town with a future.
Back in the early-1980's, the tap had opened and the money flowed and Washaw looked ready to grow, so cheap business space was built out on the east edge. Now there wasn't a single business there from the original occupants. He knew of at least three buildings at the far edge that had never had a tenant.
It had all started well enough, the project had drawn some larger chains to the area for the first time and Washaw was spoken of as a model for the future of small town America. Folks from the surrounding area drove to little Washaw to shop or dine at the new Circuit City, HomeBase, Silo, Red Lobster and Future Shop arrayed along the strip. The bump in customers and the publicity was like blood in the water, and the chains lined up, eager to take advantage of the crowds with loose cash. Washaw became a little prairie oasis of for a day of shopping, restaurants and a 12-plex theater complex. There was nothing like it and in the middle of nowhere.
Then, when everything got built up, the tap was screwed down, hard. In 1987 the wallets snapped shut and the big chain stores just slammed their tailgates and drove off. Many disappeared from the surface of the earth. Almost all of those new buildings lay empty, abandoned.
There were some small sporadic attempts to start up local businesses but none had the appeal or the resources to hang on for long. Nobody went out to buy new appliances when the old ones could be repaired for less, and the hankering for new electronics just quietly receded in favor of a little larger cushion in the bank after the mortgage payment.
Still, there were all those empty stores and nature abhors a vacuum, and MTV had done its damage and awakened the younger generations to sex, drugs and rock 'n roll, and all that needed a place to exist. So little by little, the hermit crabs that were pawn shops, liquor stores, and strip clubs crawled into the abandoned shells of the big chains and made themselves at home. That stretch of Highway 82 became a little oasis of sin, a little piece of the big-city right-smack on the edge of Mayberry.
How you gonna keep 'em down on the farm? Right? And most of the area was small towns and farmland. Washaw and the other tiny towns in the tri-county area, had been planned with a cookie-cutter from the second half of the 1800's. A center square, with a fountain or bandstand, old trees and maybe a cannon or statue from some great war, surrounded on four sides by old brick storefronts with awnings and hand painted signs that reminded Ron of new lipstick smeared on very old pigs. The downtowns all included a bakery, two cafes, the remnants of a "five & dime", a drug store, maybe an attempt at a bookstore or little fashion shop. Just off the square was the gas station and mechanic, a small grocery, the required two churches, and a feed store. Every town was the same, built on an old design that was sufficient to the needs.
But the strip glared its difference and while the town got quiet when the sun went down, the strip was just getting started. A grotesque alien limb grafted onto an alderman's body, it not only existed, it thrived. At night, you could see the its lights reflected on the clouds above for miles away. It was an anomaly. No doubt about it.
Before “the strip,” the most recent murders were towards the end of the Civil War, 150 years before, when Confederate Raiders had viciously killed two farm families, ten people in all, near Wilber-Creek. There was a brass plaque set into a limestone base in the square commemorating it.
But in the past 18 months alone, there had been 14 violent deaths on the strip and at least four were murders. That was quite a change. As you’d expect, most of the trouble came from drug and alcohol use.
So high times on the strip had brought boom times for local law enforcement. The Clayton County Sheriff's Department had received four new deputy positions, three big new SUV's, and a round of ballistic vests and military assault rifles for the house. Hoorah! Those upgrades were not to control the farmers.
Ronald Furnower worked at the Clayton County Agricultural Extension. He liked to think of it as the AgEx (Ron was a fan of Tom Clancy). The AgEx had been moved into the more cost-efficient, abandoned storefront next to Jiffy Appliance Repair which was next to Dark Knight Tattoo, home of the famous "TatTwo for One Sale, Every Day." You know the place.
Ron's job was to help local farmers, which included the new ostrich rancher and a worm farm started by a Californian, to find answers to their problems, to help them fill out applications for federal and state aid, and reconfirm the commitment made by Abe Tuttleby (that was really his name) the new Governor, to support the obsolete concept of the family farm.
Business was not overwhelming at the Agricultural Extension office, but Ron did his best to give the taxpayers their money's worth, for he was an honest man. He prided himself on his neatness and organization. It's not hyperbole to say that Ron Furnower had the most tightly organized file system in the state office world. His little coffee area was also a thing of beauty. Ron didn't drink coffee, but he made a fresh pot every morning just in case some troubled farmer should seek succor from the state.
Ron Furnower was born and raised in Washaw and he lived there still. He was 41 years old, not married and lived next door to his aged parents, who were, blessedly, still in decent health. His brothers, Donald and Xavier, both lived within an hour of Washaw, as did most other members of his extended family. He had worked by himself at the AgEx for 14 years, since graduating from the community college and had seen many changes. He liked his job, he just wished it was a little busier and didn't take place in this depressing and, frankly, scary place.
As he pulled into the parking lot at 7:17 am, it was cloudy and the headache over his eyes was in full bloom. He parked next to the large blue dumpster at the western edge of the lot, next to the chain link fence that had no obvious reason for existence since "Wild Woodie's Used Cars" had folded its tent (literally) and stolen away, three years before, leaving disappointed creditors in the rearview mirror.
Ron locked his car and then stopped, closed his eyes and slowly shook his head as he smelled the sour scent of fresh urine nearby. Unfortunately, this was not an uncommon way of starting the day here. He looked down to make sure he wasn’t standing in it and caught a glimpse of color from the corner of his left eye. Turning his head, he looked at the corner of the dumpster with its dark blue, chipped paint and saw a small puddle of red on the ground by the wheel. He froze and swallowed involuntarily.
He slowly moved along the side of his car toward the rear of the large metal box and on his second step he saw a foot, or more correctly a lower leg in jeans and a sneaker.
Ron stopped. "Hey! Hey, are you OK?" He looked around the parking lot, a few parked cars but nobody else had arrived for work this early. He was alone, or almost.
He took another step. "Buddy?" Maybe it was a woman, he should--what? Use some politically correct unisex approach until he knew for sure? He thought maybe he was overthinking this. But he did represent the State Department of Agriculture here, you know. What? "Jesus, Ron. Get a grip," he said to himself.
He took another step and saw a hand, a very pale right hand lying on the ground, palm, up. He also saw the top of the jeans and the lower forearm. Whoever it was, was sitting upright on the ground leaning back against the dumpster, and whoever it was, didn't look – umm -- healthy. He shuddered at the obvious implication and felt nausea pass over him like the flying shadow of the grim reaper in an old cartoon. The feeling passed and he stood upright and took a quick breath. He hadn't realized he'd been holding his breath and grimacing. He took another breath and felt better.
He should turn right around and go into his office and call the sheriff, right now. That's what he should do, a responsible citizen would do that now. He might, what do they call it -- umm-- mess up the crime scene and mess up the clues for what happened.
Maybe whoever did this is still here. Ron snapped upright, suddenly afraid to look behind him. Was he in danger just by finding this – uh -- body?
"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Please, don't let me get killed next to this dumpster. Please, let me live through this," he said silently, not to himself this time. This time, he was picturing in his mind the Nativity display in front of the Reform Baptist Church by his house, as he’d seen it every Christmas since he was a kid. He was asking for help specifically from the small, but powerful and accommodating Baby Jesus in the manger, lit from two sides by 200-watt waterproof flood lamps.
"He knows I love him, he won't let me die here. Please, Baby Jesus. Spread your illuminated, miracle-working presence around me and keep me safe." Ron felt better after these thoughts. He realized that the Savior and his folks were probably resting in the back of a garage somewhere at this time of year, but he was confident that they would hear his voice and respond, no matter their surroundings.
There were no sounds around him and he turned his head to see only the side of his car and the empty lot behind it. No one else was here. Whatever had happened, had happened sometime the night before. Not in the morning light. Things like this required darkness. He was safe enough right here.
He began to turn to go to his office and report this, but something made him stop. Maybe he needed to say a brief thanks to the Nativity crew for being there for him. That was a very nice idea, but that wasn't it. No, he wanted to see the body. Something made him think it was important. But something else said, Ron you don't really want to do that. The second something lost the argument and Ron took a couple more steps and turned, with exaggerated slowness, to see the what was to be seen. He lowered himself onto his haunches next to the right side of the body and looked at it, closely.
It was a young man, sitting against the dumpster, legs straight out in front of him. His chin rested on his upper chest and his mouth was open a little. The front of his sweatshirt was soaked in blood down to his waist. The crotch and thighs of the man's jeans were very dark from the release of his full bladder. His eyes were open and bulging out a little and his pupils were so large that you almost couldn't tell the color of his eyes, but Ron could see a rim of brown iris there. On his face, he had an absent expression of deep thought. The man looked young, in his 20's and slightly foreign, maybe a mixture of white with Hispanic or some south Asian blood, something like that. He had thick dark black hair and a mustache. He was kind of handsome, Ron thought.
He'd seen dead bodies before, several times, in caskets at the funeral home. They didn't look like this. This man's face was so – pale -- almost like a white porcelain cup. Ron could see the man's lower lip, it was a pale, pale, bloodless gray.
He felt as though he should be revolted, he should be disgusted and sickened by this sight, but he wasn't. For some reason, he was actually, sort of fascinated and his headache had disappeared.
As Ron squatted there next to the body, he saw his own left hand involuntarily rising toward the young man's face. What was he doing? His hand just kept moving toward the face. Just what did he think he was doing? You can't go around touching dead bodies! This guy had been shot, murdered! He couldn't touch a murdered man's face! His fingers were spread, reaching on their own for the dead man's right cheek. Ron's eyebrows raised in alarm. It was like he wasn't in control of his own left arm. Sweat broke out on his forehead as he focused his will on his own hand, and it finally stopped, maybe a quarter of an inch from the cheek. He could feel the coolness of the face radiating on the tips of his fingers.
A strong chill ran down his neck and back and the hair stood up on his arms and head. He felt very alive and alert. It was a feeling he couldn’t remember ever feeling before.
Slowly, Ron pulled his left hand back until he had full control of it and he took a deep breath and sighed.
He stood up, turned and walked around the back of his car and toward the front door of his office. He felt as if he were walking through light fog, the things around him were like pictures on the wall of an enclosed hallway. Another car pulled into the lot behind him, probably Dale from the appliance repair shop getting an early start. It was much too early for the Tattoo guys to show up.
He unlocked the front door and flipped on the lights absent-mindedly. Ron walked on back to the coffee counter and reached for the empty carafe to go refill it with fresh water, and then stopped. His eyebrows moved together into a frown and he pursed his lips and walked back to his desk and raised the handset to his ear and listened for a moment to the dial tone. Then he reached down his left hand and punched 9-1-1 and listened to the ringing at the other end.
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