Page 182 of Shhh…It’s A Killer Story

The kettle found its place beneath the tap. Cold water. Always cold water. The coffee tin opened with its familiar metallic sigh, and I measured each spoonful with quiet precision. One level scoop. Never heaped. Three slow clockwise stirs. Never four. Never anticlockwise. The surface settled into a perfect black whirlpool before becoming completely still.

Recipes make promises.

Routine keeps them.

With the mug warming my hands, I drifted toward the reading nook beside the bay window. The chair welcomed me with its familiar creak as I folded my legs beneath the oversized jersey, letting the wool pool around my ankles like an old, comfortable skin.

The manuscript waited where I'd left it.

Nearly four hundred pages now.

Its spine had begun to soften from constant handling, the corners curling ever so slightly despite my attempts to keep them immaculate. Black binder clip. Cream paper. My handwriting crawled through the margins in red and black ink like competing nervous systems.

For a long moment, I simply looked at it.

People always imagine writers creating characters. That's not entirely true.

At some point, if you spend enough time with them, they begin existing independently inside your mind. Not speaking. Not moving. Simply... waiting.

Joey had been waiting for weeks.

Patiently.

The poor girl had been standing on the edge of Chapter Twenty-Seven for three days because I'd been far too distracted watching detectives wander shirtless through neighbouring gardens.

I slipped the binder clip free, the metal snapping softly between my fingers before setting it beside the mug. The pages fanned open beneath my hands. There she was.

Joey.

Frozen exactly where I'd abandoned her. Still standing in the abandoned observatory. Still holding the bloodstained envelope. Did I ever tell you that she was skilled with computers? I guess that made things easier for her. Still waiting for me to decide who deserved to die next. I traced my fingertip lightly over her name.

"I'm sorry," I whispered, almost apologetically.

"I've neglected you."

The words disappeared into the quiet house before anyone could answer. Characters never complain. They simply wait until you're finally ready to continue their lives.

I turned the page.

"Let's see what you do next."

JOEY

The world has a remarkable talent for hiding monsters.

People imagine monsters wearing masks, sharpening knives in abandoned basements, or leaving blood dripping across polished floors. They expect violence to announce itself with screaming sirens and flashing blue lights.

It rarely does.

Most monsters wear expensive watches. They kiss their wife’s goodbye before work. They laugh too loudly at charity dinners. They shake your hand while the blood beneath their fingernails belongs to somebody else. That's why they're so difficult to find.

The police spend years looking for the man holding the weapon.

I prefer looking for the man who washes it afterward.

The files covered my desk in uneven stacks, every folder opened, closed, and opened again until the corners had begun curling beneath my fingertips. Ink stains decorated the side of my hand where my pen had rested for hours, and beside my coffee sat a notebook filled with names, dates, arrows, circles, and observations that only made sense to me.

Three men. Seven women. Two teachers. One priest. A lawyer. A truck driver.