3.20.2011
I never truly believed it was possible, but darned if Janet Davies didn't save the day.
When I read the letter she sent to Cuba, my jaw just about hit the (dirt) floor. Some freelance critic I had never heard of before all this mess was evidently responsible for the whole thing--Mary's murder, my framing, the works. Turns out he was a server with the catering company working the Halloween party that night, and when he saw me slip away, he seized his chance, locking the door behind me when I went into the broom closet and somehow luring Schmich away from the others. He probably had to listen to her talk about her Spanish lessons. It's almost enough to make me feel sorry for the bastard.
Once he had done away with Schmich, he must've waited until everyone had left to move the body to the same broom closet where I had been confined so that my fingerprints would be all over the place and everyone would assume I was guilty.
Janet had puzzled all this out due to a sloppy remark the fiend had made about how Schmich had been bonked on the head with a serving tray--a detail only he could have known about, apparently. Janet had plans to expose the villainy on a special live edition of 190 North. She assured me that the light at the end of the tunnel was beaming and I wouldn't have to wait much longer for the scales of justice to even out once more and various other cliches. I swear, the woman rights one wrongful murder charge and she thinks she's Atticus fucking Finch.
She advised me to remain in Cuba until everything was cleared up, but there was no way I was going to do that. For one thing, Cuba is a godforsaken shithole that even our goat, Felipe, seemed eager to escape. For another, I wanted the satisfaction of seeing the little freak who did this to me squirm.
And so, by various methods too exposition-heavy to go into at the moment, I found myself back in Chicago and in the Trib newsroom when Janet got the miserable louse to reveal his true colors on live television. I wore my red Wilma Flintstone wig, dark glasses, and a facial scar drawn on with makeup so that no one would recognize me.
When he ran from the room like the coward he is, I emerged from the shadows.
"Don't you think someone should go after him?" I said to those assembled.
"Don't worry," Janet said. "He won't get far. The cops have the building surrounded."
"It didn't look to me like he was planning to exit from the ground floor," I said.
"What do you mean?" Janet asked.
"He's a drama queen, isn't he?" I replied. "Where's the most dramatic place to bring this little story to a close?"
"The roof!" several people said at once, and a scuffle commenced for the door.
"No, let me," I said.
"I say, now, look here," Chris said, still not recognizing me. "I'm beginning to think the Tribune Tower's security measures have grown dangerously lax. First we let a probable murderer go running amok through the halls, then we let this disfigured redhead order us all around as if she were the proverbial Queen of Sheba. I demand a--"
But by now I had removed my wig and sunglasses and he stopped cold.
"Hedy?" he began, his lips quivering.
"Later," I said. "Right now I have a deadline to meet."
And with that, I headed for the door--the small, stunned crowd of colleagues and cameramen parting before me.
By the time I made it to the neo-Gothic roof, a neo-Gothic rainstorm had picked up and rain was pelting my small, birdlike face. I found him, clinging to the masonry, looking ready to take a flying leap from a flying buttress.
"Wait!" I shouted over the storm. "Stop!"
"You?" he said, his rain-soaked face looking on mine with horror. "But how--?"
"Various ways!" I replied. "In any case, DON'T JUMP!"
"Oh, like you give a damn!" he shouted back.
"I can't let you jump without finding out why you did this!"
"Why?" he repeated. "Why?! Ha!" And at that same moment, the thunder clapped and the lightning flashed and he looked nuttier than a bag of pecans. "You really don't have a clue, do you? You--with your job security and your health insurance and your ability to afford conditioner. I've had dry, unhealthy hair for a solid two years running! Do you know what that's like? Do you know what it's like to have to make ends meet by waiting tables or, God help you, by temping? To have 32 sets of tax documents at the end of the year? To have to scrape and scrounge and write articles for Cat Fancy magazine on new trends in scratching posts just to get by? No, of course you don't. Because you're not the lowliest, most reviled creature on earth--a freelancer! If you were, you wouldn't have to ask why someone would do anything it takes to claw himself out of the depths."
"Are you fucking kidding me?" I said. "You murdered Mary, framed me, and ruined your own life all to advance your stupid writing career?"
And he looked me dead in the eye. "I guess I'm just another victim of today's shrinking media landscape."
And before I could say another word, he jumped.
And it was over.
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