Hey guys, I was hoping to get a couple fresh eyes to look over this very quick story. It’s a short Noire-comedy piece to be submitted in for the VancouFur conbook on November 15th. I’ve already had a couple eyes on it, many thanks to Munchkin and Ash of these very forums. Just to note, I cannot increase the length of the story in any way. I’m already over the guidline’s 2k word count, and actually need to trim it some more. Warning, some references to alcohol abuse.
thank you all for your time! I hope it’s enjoyable!
Edit: Thank you guys for your help! the story has been submitted, and therefor I don’t need any more critiques! thanks again!
It Must be Suicide
I held my head in my hands and stared red-eyed at what I had scraped together as my case file. Julia Hartnell, female ferret, age 42, owner of Julia’s Tailors, had died last night. Her body was found lifeless on the cement before her shop amidst the discarded cigarette butts. “She fell” They had said. “Broke her neck.” That was all the info I’d gotten before they’d kicked me from the crime scene. Apparently when the cops ask if you’re drunk, it’s wrong to answer “I’m just really hungover”. Puking doesn’t help either.
“It was suicide.”
The words echoed in my head. That was how the dogs classified this killing. My ears flicked back and my tail lashed. The police were idiots. That’s what you get for only hiring canines to serve and protect. The entire force was great at sniffing out excuses to return to base and receive a pat on the head. “You think it was suicide? Good boy, let’s get you a raise!” You didn’t need my feline instincts to see it was murder.
What proof did the mutts have anyway? A suicide note, a history of depression, a locked door, and no odd smells. They probably counted the needles on the street as drug abuse, too. All of this evidence was circumstantial, heck, a suicide note could be written by any bum with a pen.
I knew Julia. I’d consider us acquaintances- not quite friends. She had been my tailor for a couple weeks and I had already owed her for two suits: a bottle-green Italian and a navy straight cut. She’d talked about her clientele of dirty, careless men and snooty, uptight women and how she hated that they’d smoke in her store and left their ash on the floor. I’d told her about my booze solution, but she was going clean. “My shrink said it was aggravating my depression. Been over half a year, and I’ve been feeling better.” She wouldn’t have killed herself.
The locked door was no surprise: Julia’s spare key, the one she always hid behind her mailbox, was missing. I had discovered it weeks ago when I was inspecting her place. I do that to any new place I planned to frequent. I’d have mentioned the risks of leaving a key like that, but people tended to be rude when they discover you’ve been looking around. I guess I should have warned her anyway.
At least I did my job better than the cops. The only thing those canines were good at was sniffing out criminal butts and their lack of olfactory evidence (I had peeked at their notes) was more proof of their incompetency. Sure, you could blame the heavy use of scent-masking powder most shops used in place of proper ventilation, or you could consider how many new clientele she had served that day. I knew better. Big city cops had methods of determining scent despite this, so why couldn’t our back-alley puppy force?
I would have tried sniffing the scene but it wouldn’t have helped, feline noses were built for style, not function. It didn’t matter, they had kicked me out before I could have tried. They wouldn’t have listened anyway. They never do. I didn’t even bother mentioning the missing key, those mutts didn’t deserve any extra leads. I’d solve it myself, show them a thing or two about real investigation. Maybe they would finally pay me. Or hire me. That single-genus boys club could use some independant thinkers.
My head pounded and I rubbed my eyes. I was still not over that hangover. It must have been some night— everything past my sixth pint was a blur. I can’t even imagine how much money I spent on booze. Not that I had any money. Tabs would be a godsend if you didn’t have to pay them off. I would have to go sober for a month. Again.
Assuming I got paid anything. I was a freelance investigator, a private eye. Hot dames with a troubled past and angry men with a thirst for justice were supposed to be waltzing into my office with cases to spare. They weren’t. I hadn’t had a proper case since I’d started this business. I had tried tailing the cops and helping them with their own cases, maybe ring up a little portfolio. Keyword, tried. The mutts refused to let me help. When I came to them with the solution for a case, they claimed to have already solved it (wrongly). I tried sending them my bill once, but they refused to pay, saying they never asked nor needed the help (they really did) and had begun asking for my investigators license. I had refused to give it to them (partly so they couldn’t confiscate it, partly because it was lost in the mail), and they refused to have anything to do with me.
I shuffled through the scraps of paper I had for Julia’s case file. The most interesting was a small handwritten note: “Julia’s Tailors. Dead. Talk to cops.” In immaculately neat blue ink. I must have written it while I was drunk last night, my writing was strangely perfect when I was on the sauce. I lifted it up to the dim light of my ceiling fan and squinted at it. I wasn’t sure if I was trying to decipher some hidden clues in the note itself, or trying to spark some important detail from the night before. Nothing came.
I put the note back down and looked around my tiny apartment-office. It was a one room place with an adjoining bathroom and a closet. No kitchen, no bedroom. What little space I had was covered in boxes, all half filled with my meager possessions. It looked like I had started packing while I was drunk, but I’m not sure why. The floors were made of worn, scratched wood, and the walls were covered in ugly wallpaper. The only really nice thing I had that wasn’t packed was my suits hanging in the closet.
My ears perked and then swivelled back. With Julia dead (bless her soul) she wouldn’t be looking to collect my tab. It was a bittersweet relief. I liked suits. They made me feel smart, sleek, and professional. Unfortunately they were also expensive, and I had an extensive debt to almost every tailor in the city.
Could that be why she was murdered? Money? With all the gangs and underground deals going on in this city it wasn’t impossible. Rat-King Jim was known to have people ‘taken care of’ if he thought they were charging him too much, and Blind-Eyed Marcus had dealt with another tailor on his turf who was sneaking drugs into the stitching. Would they have gone for Julia? I didn’t know. I shook my head, which caused it to throb in protest.
I hissed and squinted. My head was pounding as if someone had begun beating me with a club. I couldn’t think. Mental connections died with every thunderous beat of my heart. Maybe a month off of booze would be good for me. I gripped my desk drawer and yanked it open, looking for the bottled relief I kept inside. I began frantically digging through the mess of the drawer, shoving aside scraps of paper and empty booze samples. I tossed out an empty scent-masking powder box (I’d swear I’d had more of that) and a bundle of unopened bills before I found the elixir. Desperately I pulled out the bottle of pills and scrambled to get the lid off. Child-proof caps were going to be the death of me. I poured a couple pills into my hand, dumped them in my mouth, and gulped hard. The chalky tablets resisted the descent, but after a bit more digging, I found incentive in the form of one last, tiny bottle of liquid gold. With the pills down, I tossed both bottles back into the drawer with a clatter and leaned back, waiting for relief to wash over me.
I always found it best to let my mind wander while the pills did their work, fighting it only frustrated me more. I raised a hand and stared at my orange-and-cream striped fur. I admired how it complimented the lavender dress shirt I’d put on last night. Orange was such a nice colour of fur. Almost everything went with it; blues contrasted in spectrum, greens made me seem earthy, and browns gave me an antique aura. Even bright pink matched if I was in a party mood. Each shirt and jacket, though, was another gap in my ever deepening hole of debt dug almost exclusively by suits and beer. They were my vices, my crutches. I reasoned that if clothes and alcohol were my only sins, I was already doing better than half the crime addled city anyway. If one could not look sensible and loosen up, how were they to survive in the world?
I could feel my mind was once more my own and I intended to use the most of it. I sat up and rolled my shoulders back. I pushed aside all the things I didn’t know: motive, suspects, and methods. Time would help me with those. I needed to focus on what I did know. The one piece of evidence I kept turning over in my mind: The black hole of memory hidden behind a haze of alcohol. I picked up the hand scribed note from the folder and looked over my own writing. What had I seen? I must have known something. Had I seen her body, still warm on the pavement? Had I seen her fall? Had I seen the killer from the street, up in the window and looking down on his handiwork? I assumed it was a he. This felt like the work of a he. An angry boyfriend perhaps?
Relaxing my breathing I leaned back in my chair, closed my eyes, and tried to focus.
Dinner is noodles swiped from the corner store. There’s a knock at my door. My landlord. He hands me my eviction and demands my spare key. He left me only one, no more. I try to argue for another month, some extra time, but the fat (and frankly, ugly) badger snips his claws at me. Two weeks. Out.
Right, I was evicted. That was why I was packing. A coal of rage in my heart threatened to ignite, but it was drowned by sobriety. The eviction had been inevitable. I closed my eyes again.
I slam the door. Furious. My blood boils and I shred the envelope. I didn’t so much read the letter as try to ignite it with my eyes. I throw the paper into the corner and decide it’s time to get a drink. I slip on my favourite suit, matching black pants and jacket that shimmered crimson in the light, a lavender undershirt, and a white bowtie that brought the whole ensemble together. Being angry didn’t mean I had to be unfashionable.
I looked to the corner of the room. Sure enough the letter was there, sitting on top of a pile of dusty bottles.
I skip the closest bar, my tab’s too high. I move on to the next. Three drinks and I’m already recounting my woes to the bartender. He’s a good listener, a good looker too, for a wolf. More booze. I start a fight with someone, don’t remember who. I’m the only one kicked out. I move on to the third bar. It’s further in town.
Things were beginning to make sense. I stood up, making my chair scrape against the floor, and paced along the length of the room, trying to clear my memory. I’d seen something, I must have. I couldn’t remember making it to the next bar. I slumped on my couch and the springs creaked and sagged with age.
A realization hit me as I mapped out last night’s path in my head. Julia’s Tailors was right between the two bars. This meant I saw something at Julia’s that got my attention enough to stop. Likely her body. I leaned back on the couch and rubbed my temples. What did I see? I could visualize the residence perfectly, but I couldn’t tell if it was a memory from last night or my imagination. Damn my memory! Damn my drinking!
“Damn it!” I shouted. I stood up and threw on my coat from last night. Nothing was going to make sense to me while I was stuffed up here. I had to go out, get clues, interrogate witnesses, maybe see where Marcus’s cronies were last night. I may have had only two weeks left in this dump, but that didn’t mean giving up on the case.
I stalked to the door, opened it, and stuffed a hand in my pocket to fish out my key. I paused with my hand on the knob.
There were two keys in my pocket.
I pulled my hand out, grasping them both. One key was for my door, large, brass, with a tag that said “201”. The other was small, silver, with the initials “JT” on one side, and a piece of tape with the word “Spare” scribbled on the other side.
“Oh.” I whispered.
My hand shook as I put the key back in my pocket. I closed the door with a rattle of the knob and walked back to the boxes. I needed to pack, I needed to find a new place to live. There was no time to be investigating. No point either.
The police had been right. It must be suicide.