The problem with lying is that you have to lie everywhere.
You can’t mess up. Can’t have a kink in the chain. A crack in the armor. It’s why good prevails in the end. It’s much easier to tell the truth because the truth doesn’t change. Anywhere. But a lie does. It demands compliance or delivers death. The knife held against your throat while you talk. Serrated teeth nibbling at your carotid. One slip leads to one slit.
As they bag the body and the CSI’s take their photos of the bloodied saw and trail of blood caked on the porcelain kitchen tiles, my partner looks at me from across the room. His back leaning against the wall. His fedora shrouded his face. I couldn’t hold eye contact. His gaze forced you to look away. To meet it was defying God.
The chief walks up to me. “Anything yet?”
My partner stares as I talk, hands buried in his pockets. His black coat shrouds him in a silhouette. A void in human form.
“Witnesses say they saw a dump truck in the area, but we haven’t been able to locate it.”
“Nothing on the victim?”
“No ID. Just a bloody saw and dried blood. We think they were moved.”
My partner takes out a knife.
“I think they’re still here.”
“What?”, said the chief. “You think they’re here?”
My partner walks towards me. His steps echo on the carpet.
The chief looks at me. “What do you mean?”
“I mean”. I shake slightly trying to move my feet, but they feel chained to the floor. “I mean I think they’re here. In this house. In this room.”
My partner beneath the kitchen lights. His shadow stretches towards me. I can’t look at his face. The darkness writhes beneath his fedora. His eyes are round and deep like an owl’s. The shadows silhouetting a skull beneath the hate. I look at his shoes. His eyes never left me.
“Where”, said the chief.
I point to the fridge. My partner takes a few more steps forward. Now he’s in front, our shoes almost touching. There’s no way to look where he isn’t there.
The chief opens the fridge. “It’s empty.”
My partner stares back. I can’t look. I try looking at the chief, but he’s behind my partner. I could see the knife rise to meet my eyes.
“Where”, said the chief.
The blade is up to my throat. My partner waiting on what I’d say next. I know what to say next. The same way I knew about the warehouse last month. And the storage unit before that. The lie put it there. Through my hands.
“Be-hb-behind.”
The chief moved the fridge & found a passage.
“Hey, call for back up, there’s more here!” He clicked on the flashlight & went downstairs.
My partner stayed staring at me. I looked from his shoes and to his face. In his dark sullen eyes, he smiled and removed the knife.
But the chief would have questions. Lots of questions. And each question would require an answer. Each answer, a lie. Behind me, my partner leans against the wall.
The lie was intact.
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