Asshole

"Thorsen residence, This is Becky?"

"Becky, are you sitting down? This is Kent" the caller introduced himself.

"Yeah, I'm sitting. I'm surprised to hear from you is all. Its been what, nearly three years since there's been a lead?" Becky scolded.

"About that - I'm not sure how pleased you'll be when you hear from whence came the lead," Kent sounded pensive. He continued, "You remember that tattoo that you said Mark had when you two were married.. Ah, shit. I mean when you two got married.. Well, someone turned up in Phoenix with a tattoo on their left ankle that looks like little more than a five pica smudge. It could be a script letter."

Becky nearly shouted into the phone, "Well, why the fuck don't you ask the asshole if he's my husband?"

"Becky, the asshole with the tattoo is at the county morgue."

Kent heard the phone fall on the floor and what could only have been a banshee wail, "FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUK!!!" he held the phone away from his ear.

He heard fumbling as the phone was recovered. He could hear noises that sounded like snot in a bong, Becky was losing it. Her nose was a copious runner when she was upset. "Does it look like him?" More snuffling. "Doesn't he have ID? Dental records? Anything?"

Kent didn't want to cause her to go into hysterics but the authorities needed something to help them identify if the cadaver was, in fact, her husband. Considering what was at stake here, he needed to find another way to identify the body. "The guy at the morgue doesn't have any ID. He's around 5' 10", 145 pounds. Most of his teeth are gone, they look to have been pounded out of his mouth by the way the mandible is set wrong and the bone loss around the gums. Some were proper extractions, the ones in the back." He took a deep breath. "Listen, Becky. You need to know that the guy at the morgue was run down in the street. His face took a lot of the hit and his shoulder is crushed. His left hand was de-gloved when the car tire braked over him. The police are investigating it as an honor killing involving a Jordanian family. He was alleged to have pushed the girl out of the way of the car before he tripped and the girl's father ran him down instead. Some people at the homeless shelter knew him, but only called him 'Asshole'."

"Oh!" Becky choked on a sob. "No! no no no no! NO! That's not HIM! It can't be!"

"So, what do you have that would help to identify him? Do you have any record of fingerprints, DNA? Anything we can use?" asked Kent. "We'll need to go there. To Phoenix. Can you find someone to watch Erica while we go? We need to move fast. They want to inter the body quickly, so we'll need to either stake a claim or let them do their thing."

"Oh, fuck. This can't be. It can't be him. Asshole! That's the last thing I said to him before he ran out. Literally... ran... out!" Becky couldn't control her voice any longer. She was crying hard enough to give herself hiccups.

"Becky, I'll fly to Phoenix this afternoon and meet with the county coroner. You try to find something that will help us identify him positively. Maybe get a swab from Erica. We'll need to be absolutely sure its him in order to get a release on the trust and the estate if it is him."

Becky looked behind her. She stood up and ran her fingers over the drywall into which the ring was embedded. She'd done that many times over the years since it was flung there. The paint was worn now and dark right over the hole. The metal still bore a rusty hue from dried blood that was on the wedding band from when Mark had torn it from his finger and threw it like shuriken into the dry-wall. She gathered herself together enough to use a letter opener to pick it out and drop it into a Ziploc bag trying not to touch it too much. The ring had been there for nearly six years. It served to remind her of what she was missing, what she longed to have returned to her.

She never realized how heavy the ring was as it dropped into the bag, the edge of which she held pinched nearly slipped from her fingers when it slid down the letter opener and plopped unceremoniously into the bag. She remembered for the first time in years how he'd play with that ring between his thumb and pinkie finger, twisting it and sliding it up and down the knuckle of his ring finger. Maybe here was the tissue they needed to dismiss the good barrister Kent's suspicion that her husband was now an unknown homeless person rotting in a Maricopa county morgue.

She picked up the phone.

+----+

"Hello?" Stefan answered the phone.

"Stef! It's Becky! Kent thinks he found Mark! He thinks he's dead! In Phoenix! It can't be! I can't.."

"Slow down! What do you mean, thinks he found Mark? We thought he was out of the country. I always wish I knew what'd happened before I setup that trust for him six years ago. We couldn't even find out if he'd used it after the way it was built."

"There's a guy. He's at the county morgue there, he's got a tattoo like the one you and Mark got in seminary. Oh, Stef! It can't be him!" she sobbed again on the phone.

"Phoenix. That makes sense since he picked up Emily in Flagstaff after he ran out. I checked and she was gone after you told me he abandoned you. I'd already had our accountants setup the trust and he resigned from the board. Is Trish there?"

That seemed to bring her around a little. "She's upstairs sleeping. I was going to tell him I was pregnant that day he left. I have to go down there. I can have my parents meet me at the Pittsburgh Airport so I don't have to drive all the way up north to Indiana and back down tomorrow morning. They want positive ID, but the way... the way he's... They want DNA or fingerprints!"

"Oh, shit! Let me line things up tonight and I'll try to get there tomorrow with you."

"Can Catriona come? I don't know how I'll.."

"I'll see. She's out of the country again. Something with her mother. I'll fill you in tomorrow."

+----+

Stefan boarded the plane in Chicago and sat down next to a tall woman with brownish red hair, the frizzy way she wore it looked unkempt with mad streaming curls hiding her face. She was searing a high collared, sleeveless knit green shirt and black yoga pants. Not skinny nor chubby, her breasts jutted just past her stomach but she looked fit with the right tone in her arms without being ripped. She looked every bit like the Russian Jewish descendant she was. She'd been looking out the window and didn't notice him board the plane after it stopped on the way to Phoenix. She was wearing dark sunglasses. Her nose and lips looked red and chapped from wiping.

She didn't pay any attention to him sitting next to her until another passenger asked, "I think you're in my seat."

Stefan offered the passenger his own boarding pass backed by Ben Franklin and shook his head. The other passenger looked at the woman next to him, took the new seat assignment and nodded compassionately.

Becky wiped her arm across her nose again and startled, "How did you.."

"I figured you would have taken this flight, so I thought I'd jump on and join you."

She wiped her snotty hands in her yoga pants and took off her sunglasses. Her golden brown eyes looked like they were bleeding from the crying and the abrasion of her hands.

"Thanks for doing this. Kent's already there. I brought his wedding band, I never took it out of the wall until last night. It still has some blood from when he tore it off his finger. I did manage to get a DNA swab from Erica."

"Do you mind telling me again what happened that day?"

"We've been over and over but here you go again. I knew that Mark had a meeting that day but he wouldn't tell me anything about it. I think it had something to do with your grammar engine that he liked to call it. I never got to talk to him all week about how I was feeling, tired and nauseous in the morning, he seemed so agitated all week about that Friday meeting.

"I had confirmed with our doctor that we were indeed on our way to finally growing our family. Kent came over to pass off documents that Mark needed in case the meeting went bad. My ankles were swollen so he was giving me a foot rub on the couch when Mark nearly tore the door off its hinges. He was mumbling and his eyes were wild, scanning back and forth without moving his head."

Stefan said, "Oh, my." Placing his hand to his mouth in an apologetic way to let her know to continue.

"When Mark finally looked at us, he yelled 'What the fuck is going on here!?!' I mean, Mark knows Kent is gay as a Christmas goose. This was no seduction!

"Anyway, between my finely honed skills at confrontational management and fine social grace, I shouted back, 'What the fuck does it look like, Asshole!'"

She stopped to choke again on the sob that gripped her entire chest. Every passenger around them was now staring.

Stefan looked at them, held his palm out face down in a "Put down your guns" gesture and looking around said, "She lost her husband." The faces turned away to return to the in-flight magazines and shopping catalogues.

Stefan took her snotty hand in his. Her hand was nearly as big as his, pale and freckled. She still wore her wedding band and engagement ring on it. It felt strong in his, but quivering. "Go on" he gently prodded.

More slurping as she cleared her sinus yet again. "I've never been afraid of him before. No.. That's not right. I've never been so afraid _for_ him before. I thought he was trying to break his finger off. When he pulled his ring off he must have peeled his finger like a banana with his fingernails. I barley noticed the flip he did with his wrist, but I heard a metallic ping on the wall between Kent and me and felt the blood drops on my face and arms. By the time we looked where the ring hit the wall and back to Mark he was gone!"

She clutched his arm and felt very tired, leaning down to put her face on his shoulder. "You're gonna snot all over me you know." He pushed her back, lifted the armrest between them and pulled her back into a hug. She wasn't crying now and her voice sounded timid as she continued.

The plane was in the air now and he barely heard her finish. "Kent got up to chase after him. I was kind of pissed and shocked at the same time. His car was still there. Kent laughed. 'He went on foot! This shouldn't take long.' I had to remind him that Mark was in marathon shape, even though he wasn't fast he could be more than a mile away by now. We drove around. Found his jacket, nothing else. The police found his wallet later. All his credit cards were gone and the cash but it looked like whoever turned it in had used the cards. They had some video surveillance from Macy's and from some gas stations where I guess the fuckers test credit cards at the pay pumps to see if they were working or not without having to hand them to a clerk. Mark never used them that night. He threw his pants in the trash with his wallet."

Stefan looked down at her. She looked up at him. Her eyes were the golden brown of a chocolate lab. He took a deep breath and sighed.

"I suppose its my turn now to help fill in some of this blind spots? Can we wait for the beverage service?"

To be continued...