“Yeah.” I wiped away a stray tear. “Thanks for the news report Captain Obvious.”
Barb didn't skip a beat. “What were their names?”
“Two of them don't matter. They had dinner with Luci a long time ago.” I tried to hide the sniffle and failed. “Callen. He’s the last one.”
“Do you have a last name?”
“Whitcomb. Callen Whitcomb.”
Her fingers flew furiously over the keyboard and it didn't take long before the tales of Callen's life were displayed like a buffet in front of us.
His face hit me before the words did. It wasn’t news that he existed. I had seven boxes to prove that. But seeing him rendered by a living feed on the internet instead of yellowed clippings felt like a sucker punch. All of these years, I’d kept him frozen on paper. On Barb’s screens he wascurrent. The camera didn’t care that I’d tried to stop time.
“Well, well,” Barb murmured around the finger rubbing her bottom lip. More clicking. More scrolling. “Oh, he’s good.”
“I'm feeling left out over here, Barb," I said impatiently because it was safer than admitting my hands were shaking.
“Antisocial personality disorder, textbook narcissism, and the ability to hidewithin society, completely undetected, like a chameleon.”
“We're not talking about you, Barb. We were talking about Callen.” I was only half joking. Having Barb there with me was like a comfort. If I stared too long at the screens, I’d float away in the despair Callen had left me to die in. Barb was grounding, though. And so was our reliable banter.
“Pfft,” she waved dismissively. “I'm not a narcissist.”
“I'm not a fancy psychologist like you, but I'm pretty sure that’s something a narcissist would say.”
“Piss off,” she said, her eyes still narrowed and skimming the fine details of Callen's life.
A photo snapped open on the center screen. It was Callen outside a tidy doorway; the big wooden slab was decked out in fresh garland with two festive trees on either side. Perfect white teeth shone all in a row from his big fucking smile with a pretty blonde wife on his arm.
Ordinary.
That was the part that lit the fuse. He’d built himself a life while I was fighting to stay above water in the afterlife, drawing in death and self-loathing. I hadn’t wanted to admit that it was time to face the proverbial music.
I squared my shoulders and summoned the rage that brought me to this moment.
“Alright. Let’s go catch ourselves a monster, Batty Barb.”
I tucked all of the information I'd learned about Callen into the evidence box sitting atop my coffee table. After years of hiding, I felt like I was finally ready to face the demons of my past.
“That that's ironic as fuck huh?” I said aloud to Jesus who was perched on the couch, staring at me. “It's almost like I was always destined for hell.”
“Are you just now figuring that out?" I mocked in my best Jesus impression. He sounded like a real dick.
“Oh shut up, your holiness. We can't all be as omnipotent as you.” He answered with an annoyed growl, and it made me smile. “Are you sure you don't want to join me for my stake out? It's going to be fun,” I said in a singsong manner. Jesus stood, stretched, and turned to face the wall where he promptly curled back into a ball of furry hatred. “Oh come on. I'm bringing snacks!”
“Fuck all the way off,” I answered for him. Is that really what he'd say? I've never actually known, but my educated guess was a solid one.
As I sat with Barb, scrolling through Callen's life for hours, it solidified my need to trust my instincts. Any outsider looking in would consider him a standup citizen. He was a wealthy businessman with a family. He hosted company parties, donated to several charities, volunteered at homeless shelters…
The only thing the man didn't have was a goddamn key to the city.
I knew what the newspapers didn't though.
I knew what he was capable of. What lengths he was willing to go for entertainment. I've witnessed firsthand the obsidian film that blanketed his eyeswhen he held someone's life in his hands.
Callen got off on playing God.
He was about to learn that the one thing more powerful than the Almighty was Satan's scorned mistress.
