Best Overall Short Story 2010

Mr Adam Raby
12th Grade -Enloe High School
Teacher: Ms. Rita Achenbach


The Unfortunate Situation Surrounding Mick and the Carved Raven


He was found slumped over his workbench, a tiny hammer clutched in his muscle-bound hand.
Of course the police ruled homicide, but that did nothing to alleviate the questions. Why? How?
Why would someone kill the nicest man on Earth, and how did they do it? No murder weapon
was found, nor did there seem to be any actual wound. That's where I came in.

I. The Client

It was a quiet Wednesday morning when he arrived at my office. You know those seedy little
offices where all those Noir movies seem to take place, the ones that are barely a room and a
desk and seem to be right next to the dramatic lighting factory? Well. My place isn't exactly like
that. I guess I wasn't really thinking about my profession when I bought my office; it's in a nice,
bright, and cheery little subdivision, (good location, no crime). What was I thinking? This
completely kills the mood sometimes. Do you know how many people judge a detective by the
kind of neighborhood his office is in? Trust me; I've tried my damndest to make the office look
like I'm the kind of gumshoe who doesn't take nothin' from nobody. But when your home turf is
flanked on both sides by 'Happy Kid's Dentistry' and 'Arby's', it makes it a little hard to convey
that image. Usually I only get cushy cases, cuckolded housewives trying to figure out if their
husband is cheating around on them (and sometimes the husband with some hush money). I
guess before this the most dangerous case I had ever had was investigating who embezzled some
money from some quaint little department store. So yeah, not exactly the life of daring and
mystery that I had dreamed of. Of course, this all did happen to change; as soon as he entered my
door I knew that I was in for something more. So he knocks three times on my door, I can see his
shadow look around to check and see if he was followed, and then he opens and crosses the threshold. All three clocks on my walls show exactly 7:30 as he passes through the waiting room (obviously noticing that there is no one waiting) and sees himself directly into my office. As soon as this guy comes in, I can tell that he owns the place. You know those people, the type that walk into a room and you can see their confidence. Well, this guy didn't seem to just own the room, the way he strode in made him look as if he thought he was the king of the world. But the thing is, as soon as you see him, you would start believing it too. The way he held himself, it looked like the King of the Stripmall had stumbled into my place.

The King, as I had subconsciously taken to calling him, wore a nice looking suit. Not too
new, but it had not yet developed the creases that one finds with age. His face looked exactly the
same, like someone was borrowing the face, and they were intending on returning it before it got
too old. In fact everything about him seemed average yet a little bit off. Everything except for the
missing eye. His eye patch was the only purely real thing about his face - all the other things
were just trappings of a normal life. His whole ensemble seemed to point right to that patch, like
it was the end all and be all about him. I thought about telling him that I was busy on an
important case (mayor's wife thought the old man was cheating on her. Turns out he was, but so
was she) but I decided that I would like to eat well this month and kept my mouth shut. He
looked around my room and decided on which chair he wanted to sit in. He picked the nice plush
lavender armchair, nice choice -that's the comfiest. He makes himself comfortable for about a
minute, and then notices that I am sitting patiently waiting for him to say something. Noticing
the lull in our conversation he decides to officially tell me why he was in my office.

"A man was killed today. He was a good man, sure not exactly a smart man. But he was a man
nonetheless." He stops, and for a moment I think he might start crying with his one good eye.
But that was only for a moment and he keeps going. "But you don't care about who dies and who
doesn't. You peer at your newspaper everyday and skip right past the obituaries. No one reads
those anymore¼ The birds tell me that you're probably the best, and cheapest, detective in town.
And I've even gotten a word of recommendation from one of your old pals hmm¼ what was his
name." He pauses, and listens for a moment. And I swear, I hear something, the rustling of the
wind through the last leaves one October day. I become so transfixed at trying to find the
location of the sound that I almost miss what he says next. "Ah yes, Two-Bit Johnny. He seemed
to think very highly of you when I talked to him earlier today." The conversation seemed to just
freeze right there.

"Umm... sir you must be joking." I stuttered for a second. "Two-Bit Johnny has been dead for
about five years."

"Oh really? Well that must be my mistake." The conversation reached an awkward lull; I wasn't
sure whether he was waiting for me to say something or if he was planning on telling me
something. After about a minute he looked back at me and started talking again. "The reason I
came here today was to hire you to find out who killed Percy Baldoor. I expect you'll be
charging me for your original rates and expenses-what, do you have a problem with this?

Yeah actually I do. This is really, really boring. You've gotten too fixed in the details. I saw what
happened, and it did not go down like this.

Look, I'm telling this story, not you. If you want I can skip a little bit around. Cut out the
boring stuff. If that's ok with you?

I was actually quite enjoying this. I think the extra details help set the stage.


No one cares about you. Look. All I am saying is that we've only got a limited time to talk... this
time we have together will end at any moment. Just hurry.

Just stop fighting, I think this may be the best rendition yet¼ come on guys, we only have a little
while left together, why don't you just let him tell his story the way he wants.

Thank you so much for taking my side for once... umm ok, you want to skip straight to the
action? The Real meat of the story. Ok here we go... um, well the detective and the old man
talk business for a while. Hammer out the prices and the expenses. Old guy leaves.
Detective decides to visit the body. Am I skipping enough for you? Or would you like me to
go right to the ending?

Ok look I'm sorry, you can stop being passive aggressive now. Ok?? Just get on with your stupid
story.

Fine I guess we'll just skip to part II: The Crime scene

Ahem - The body was long gone by the time I had arrived at the scene of the murder. If there
was a murder, the police seemed to think there was some foul play but there is no actual sign of
damage. I looked one last time over the information that my sources dug up. What? Wikipedia?
No not Wikipedia. I didn't interrupt you for your story you know. Yes, but this makes it so
much more fun. No, I got my sources from an awesome legitimate source. His name was Tim
and he was my answer man. Whenever I needed data and I needed it fast I called for Tim and he
got me the scoop. Percy Baldoor, by the looks of things, was the nicest man the world had ever
known. Volunteered in at least one soup kitchen a day, gave to charities, ran charities, and was
always seen helping out the poor and needy. He became a local celebrity a few years ago after he
rescued the local orphanage from a fire. He saved all of the kids, and put out the fire before the
fire department even got there. When asked later if he was afraid in the face of death he replied
"Not at all, I do not fear the flames for they have pledged not to hurt me." This caused some
minor debates about what he actually meant, but most people decided that he was talking about
bravery in the face of duty. People started calling him "Invincible Percy", so I guess I can
understand the shock and worries around his death. I stepped out of my car and walked towards
the nice little cabin that was Percy's home, and showed myself into his garage. Everything but
the body was there, left exactly where he put it. It seemed like he was carving a miniature raven.
He had pictures and blueprints layed out for what he wanted his finished product to look like.
The wood block on the table screamed of ruined potential, I swiped a few of the blueprints and
vowed that maybe one day I'd finish his final project. There really wasn't much to see so I
finagled my way into his address book and got down some names and addresses of the dearly
departed's close loved ones. I had some interviews to conduct.

III The Interviews

There weren't many names and addresses on the list that weren't for charities. It's like the man
did not have a social life. The names that I could find that seemed like they were actually
personal were few and far between. But I did manage to narrow it down, and (score!) I found the
address of his mother. I scheduled her in last, I did not want to trouble her seeing as her baby boy
was just found murdered. First things first I went to talk to Horton, who's supposedly the
deceased's brother. Word on the street is that they weren't the closest, but hopefully he would be
able to clear things up about potential medical problems (I didn't want to bother his mom until I
was desperate; there are just some protocols that you don't break). There must be some reason
why Percy just stopped dead right before carving that Raven - and since there was no signs of a
struggle- I figure that medical history would be a nice start before moving into poisons. We met
up around five o'clock at this little diner that occupies the same stripmall as my office (I eat there
for the convenience and the atmosphere, not for the food). He told me over the phone that I
should talk to everyone who enters the restaurant to see if it was him, and as soon as he came in
the door I could see why. Well, I didn't see him first; I saw his white pole leading the way into
the diner first. If I had known he was blind, I probably wouldn't have organized his interview
first. Nothing against blind people, I'm sorry they've been dealt a tragic hand in life, but it can be
really REALLY hard to get substantial evidence for a murder case from a blind man. Sure, what
the killer smelled like may be interesting on TV, but it means nothing to me. I do not particularly
have the best nose to begin with, and now I have to compare it with Daredevil and that just does
not help. I decide that I'm going to ask him all about family history instead. Of course I did not
know that the blind man was to be my interviewee, I had gone through about 22 people asking if
I was supposed to meet them until he came in. I pulled him a chair and we began. I decided to
open it up with a little small talk, just to loosen up the tongue. "So Horton, did you make it here
all right? The directions didn't give you trouble?"

IV Horton Baldoor

He responded slowly, like he was choosing his words carefully, unsure of what to say. He was a
small fellow, blonde hair, and he seemed to have a Scandinavian build. He was Skinny but frail,
in fact he looked like he would have blown over if there was a decent amount of wind in the
diner. "Oh no sir, I got here just fine. I just had my friend drive me over. You don't have to talk
to me like I don't have any idea what I'm doing, sir. I'm blind, but I'm not stupid. I've been
blind since I was born, so I know how to take care of myself." This took me by surprise; I guess
the boy's got a little more bite than I thought. It looks like he came prepared, what better way to
catch him off guard then to ask the 64,000 dollar question right here and now.
"So, when was the last time that you saw your brother alive?" I watched his face, looking for any
emotional betrayal.

"Actually I saw him the day right before his death."

"Really? That's some news to me. Have you told the police about this?" I had just hit the
jackpot. This must be my big break in the case. I think I need to add his name right to the top

"Oh yes. Yes I did. I bet we all did. It was one of our family gatherings you see. Percy loved to
get us all together around once a year. I guess he felt guilty that we aren't the nicest or happiest
of families, but we all agreed to play nice once a year. It's quite nice, I don't have to worry about
my brothers tripping me. Do you know how much peace that one day brings me?" His mouth
curled into a content smile, like a cat who just discovered the keys to the birdcage. Why would a
birdcage have keys? Shut up, I'm a detective and I can make up my own metaphors.
Detectives always make up their own metaphors, it's like Detective code or something.
"Every single one of our family saw him the night before he died."

"What time was the party?" This was a good starter, set the scene, get him off his guard so I can
hit him with the hard questions later.

"It started exactly at 8 o'clock at night. It wound down at approximately one o'clock that night."
Wow, this guy doesn't even break a sweat.

"Ok, so how many people were there? Any names that I should know about?"

"Oh, it wasn't that big. Maybe 15 of us? There aren't that many of us nowadays. I guess we used
to have more, but they just slipped through the woodwork. I'm probably not the best person to
ask this because I'm¼ well, blind. From the different voices I heard I'd say there were around
15 people. Um, well our mom was there, you probably already are going to talk to her." Yes I
was, this kid has obviously been thinking this over as much as I have. "Um, Linda was there,
have you talked to her yet?" I shook my head no. "Yeah, that would be a good idea. It would be
hard to Miss Linda, she's about six feet eight inches tall. See it's a pun, of course I only know
that from what they say because..."

"I know, you're blind."

"You're catching up on this pretty quick. Ah, have you gotten an interview with Louis yet??
He's our half-brother, the black sheep of the family. I guess you haven't heard of him much, he
changed his name back to his other last name 'LeSmithe'." Horton seemed to shudder at the
mention of his accursed half-brothers other name. "He may be one of the main reasons we only
get together about once a year. If anyone should be a suspect of foul play in this family it would
be him." I was taken aback by how angry Horton seemed to be getting, I guess that Louis seems
like a tricky subject for Horton. I quickly changed the subject.

"Horton, what went on at the party exactly? Did you play any games, did anything seem out of
the ordinary to you?" And just like that the anger was gone. Whatever had bubbled up to disturb
the calm surface of Louis quickly subsided back down to the bottom of the ocean.

"Oh that's easy. Percy always sets out a huge feast for the family. We spend about two hours
eating and talking, finding out what happened to everyone over the past year. Usually father
makes a big speech, have you met father yet? He's a grizzled old man with an eyepatch, talks to
himself all the time. I would give you more descriptions than that but..."

I cut him off "Yes Horton, I know. You're blind. Just keep going." I did not mean to snap at
Horton, but I was intrigued by this. The old man who hired me was at the party. That means he
was one of the last people to see Percy alive. I'd have to think about this. The old man might be
trying to pull a Roger Ackroyd on me.

"Well... father makes a speech, usually about family history and great battles yet to be fought
and such. It gets pretty boring; we've been listening to the same speech for years. After that we
usually do an exchange of gifts, and then after that we have the usual contest." He suddenly
clammed up, the look on his face made-out like he had already mentioned a bit too much than he
probably should have. Then with a bolt of energy he stood up and said "Well sir, thank you so
much for the lovely lunch, but I have to go. Right now." And he was off like a rocket; if
someone had seen him bolt out of that café they would have sworn that he could use his eyes.

This lunchtime conversation left me with more questions than I had answers. Well, really I got a
whole bunch of answers, but now I had completely new questions to ask. I know what the
recently deceased was doing the night before, but I only had the vague picture. I needed a few
more happy trees on the canvas before I could call it a completed painting.

V Louis

Seeing that I had a little time to spare until I talked to Miss Linda, I decided to look up Louis
LeSmithe. Seemed he owned a tacky little bar named "Kaos" not too far from my place. The
inside was even worse than its name would have you believe, there was cheesy plush and leather
everywhere. Everything, from the bright purple lampshades to the neon dayglow chairs was
obnoxious. Just being in there felt like my head was being assaulted by thirteen heavily armed
elephants. If this pub was any reference for the man's character then I can understand why no
one in his family likes him. That's a bit harsh you know, I wanted that bar to be obnoxious. I'm
the one telling the story ok. When it's your turn you can tell it any way that you want. Ollie
likes me. No he doesn't. I think he likes all of us equally. Shut up. I made my way up to a
disillusioned college kid and asked him if his Louie was in. I got a muffled "yeah" and was
pointed in the direction of the main office. The office was quite different than the rest of the bar,
I really was expecting another gaudy obnoxious attack on decency, but the office was much more
subdued. In fact it seemed that Mr. LeSmithe had a pension for world travels, his room was
littered with artifacts from all sorts of trophies from far off lands. Behind his desk there was a
portrait of a small spider weaving his webs above a large group of animals.

"Like the painting, don't you? 'Anansi the Spider addressing the animals of the world.' A good
friend of mine painted that for me." A voice that oozed like black velvet caught me by surprise.
"You're the dick that Pa sent to find out who murdered dear old 'Invincible Percy', aren't you?"
He made the little quotation marks in the air when he said 'Invincible Percy,' I didn't need to be
a detective -which I was- to feel the animosity Louie felt towards his half brother. "I know who
killed him, in fact, I'll tell you if I find you entertaining. I bet you talked to poor old Horton
about the party. Don't look at me like that with the slack look on your face. Goodness, Darwin
was wrong, you must have descended from an Orangutan. I have my ways of finding out.
Bernice the waitress happens to be a friend of mine. I bet you bought that sad look on his face
and the whole 'I may be blind but I'm not stupid' routine. How about I give you a little hint to
help you on your way. How was Percy killed? Think about that for a second? Do you even have
any idea how the murder occurred? Have you even thought into looking into our family history?
Medical records? Has it even occurred to you to check his Autopsy? Don't worry, I'll send a
copy to you when you go talk to my mom. Well let me give you a little something that might
have slipped the tabloids, the man was a drunk. Swore he was impervious to any drink. Did you
get to talk to Horton about our favorite game? We would spend the year coming up with a new
drink to try to turn his stomach. It was a big wager set up by Percy himself, if anything would
make him sick he would donate around 1000 dollars to a charity of his choice. If not we'd all
have to donate 100 dollars to said charity. That bleeding heart, and you know what, he had never
ever donated the thousand. It seemed like nothing on earth could hurt him. Who knows, maybe
someone mixed something last night that really knocked him out for good. Heh, it would be the
ultimate of ironies. 'Invincible Percy' taken down by a silly mixed drink made by his family.
Wanna know what was in mine this year?" I nodded my head yes, it seemed like sacrilege to say
something and interrupt this man's train of thought. He was on a roll, and I was getting more and
more insight into this family affair. "It was quite the fancy brew. 2 parts gin, 1 part tonic, two
cubes of dry ice (purely for the looks of course) a lovely quart of Guatemalan Insanity Hot Sauce
(half a quart is guaranteed to burn off any sane man's taste buds), a touch of lime, and the piece
de resistance two squirts of liquid nitrogen. What can I say, that man really is invincible. You
should ask around what other people put into their drinks. I bet that's the key to what killed
him."

"I thought you said you knew what killed him"

"Oh that? I lied to get your attention. Got you to stay didn't it? Oh don't look at me like that.
You learned a lot didn't you? I bet old Horton didn't tell you about the drinks now did he? I
wonder why? I can't exactly say, I'm not the detective. I believe you've overstayed your
welcome sir. You've already missed your appointment with Miss Linda, but you still have time
to go see dear old Mum. Tell the old bat hi for me, will ya?" Dammit, he was right. I was so
engrossed in what he was saying I didn't notice how long it was taking. I guess I may have been
more engrossed in what he was saying than I thought. I grabbed my things and bolted for the
exit, knowing that I would most likely be late for the most important interview of all.
 

VI Dear Old Mum

"You're late" Those were the first words to come out of Ma Baldoor's mouth. I gasped (running
up 7 flights of stairs, while quicker than the elevator, is not fun) and mouthed apologies. "I'll
have to talk with dear Ollie about who he decides to hire for help. All of our handymen are on
time."

"Are your handymen trying to figure out who killed your son? Wait, what? You can actually get
them to come on time, they are always like, 5 hours late when they come to my house."

"That is neither here nor there, son. I believe you would like to talk to me about sensitive matters
concerning the death of my baby boy." She looked straight into my eyes and for a moment I
wondered who was really running the interview. She was a plump old woman, with the looks of
one who long passed from the realm of beauty into the realm of grandmothering. The wrinkles
crossed her face like a roadmap, and her hair was as white as the snow that you only get to see in
greeting cards and cheesy Christmas specials. "Son, I know you scheduled me last, but I believe
I could tell you everything you would like to know. I've known this day has been coming ever
since little Percy first came to his mommy about the bad dreams."

"Dreams? When was this." This was getting quite intriguing, this must be the key to the entire
thing.

"Oh I don't know. Must have been¼" She paused for a second, her eyes seemed to be viewing
something that I couldn't exactly see. "Oh it was a few years before he saved all those kiddies. I
have the newspaper clip on the wall." I looked to see and there it was, the faded yellow type
proclaimed 'Daring Orphan Rescue Performed by Invincible Percy.' "See he came to me with
bad, bad dreams. He told me that he was going to die soon, and that everything would collapse
soon after that. But Ollie and I had a plan, we went to everything and made them swear that they
would never hurt my baby boy ever again. Well, almost everything. We didn't have mistletoe
swear because it is just too young a plant to make such serious bargains." Ok, I take it back. The
lady is a few ravens short of a murder. "He became impervious to everything. Fire, poison,
explosions. Everything except for Mistletoe, it became a sort of Kryptonite for him. When we
would have our lovely little get-togethers he would prove it by drinking anything that we would
put in front of him. He would do it for charity too, that noble soul. I always keep the recipes " As
bizarre her story seemed, it made sense.

"Did you happen to get the Autopsy that Louis sent? And do you still have the recipes for the
recent parties?" My mind was racing. The pieces were all slowly falling into place and I was one
straight line away from a tetris. I had what I needed, I know who did it, and all I needed to know
now was why.

VII Whodunnit

It's not exactly hard to sneak up on a blind guy. To tell you the truth, I think he wanted me to
catch him. I was about to get his attention when I was tapped on the shoulder by a grizzled hand.
It was Ollie, what he was doing here at my moment of triumph was unknown. "I know who did
it! I yelled! It was Horton, he put mistletoe (which for some reason is poison to Percy) into
Percy's Mojito. The poison slowly crept through his system until he succumbed at his desk. I
know all of that, but I don't know why?" I looked into his one blank eye, waiting for anything.

"I knew that already Mick. I knew it before I even came to your office. It all happens again see,
the stories are so old they repeat again and again. But the content is still the same. Hero dies, evil
prevails, the world plunges into darkness. I just had to make it look like I cared before the whole
world went to Hell, literally. Oh and by the way, Louis switched the mint that Horton planned to
use with the mistletoe. He knew that Horton always made the same drink for Percy every year.
He just waited until his time was right to make the switch."

"But why?"

"Does the end of the world need to have a reason?"

"I'd say yes? But I guess my opinion doesn't matter."

"No it doesn't, this has been fated to happen since the end of time. And it has. It has happened
again and again and again. On and on, the constant cycle of birth and destruction. We are all bit
players, doing the role we have been assigned." Well that's comforting. There was a sound like
thunder being ripped into a million pieces and the end of the world began. I looked at the grizzly
old man next to me, and everything made sense.


How was it?

Eh, it was ok. Could have used some action.

Maybe next time, I'll see you guys next apocalypse.

Sure, sure. Bye Anansi.

Have a Good time Louie

You too Mick, you too.