The Truth Berries

VII

       The 2 am call promised a full day again for him. He sat on the edge of his bed listening to the woman’s voice on the other end of the line, eyes still closed. He was hearing only bits and pieces of the news for he was still half- sleeping.

“. . . two bodies . . .A male and a female. . . in their late twenties. He was shot . . . she was r***d. . . then they cut her throat . . . construction site by the shopping mall. No one is available at the moment. Make haste.”

       He put the phone down and rubbed his eyes. The woman’s voice on the phone signaled the start of his day. It has been that way for the past fifteen years of his life as a police investigator. He shook off the last remnants of sleep and went to the bathroom. He splashed cold water and washed his face. Then, he took the towel and dried himself. He looked at himself in the mirror and wondered if he still knew the man staring back at him. Fifteen years of devotion to his job. Fifteen long years of solving heinous crimes and putting criminals behind bars in hopes of eradicating injustice in his beloved country. It did cost him a lot – his friends, his youth, his health and his wife, Nadia. He had so little in return.

       When he reached the construction site, a single police car was parked along the desolate road, its blue and red light flashed repeatedly. He parked his 2003 white Honda Civic behind it. His long-time partner, Alex Gonzalo, was already questioning the guard on – duty when the crime was timed approximately. Behind him was a young boy, still shaken from the turn of events. As he was walking towards them, Alex noticed him and greeted him.

       “I think this is the first time I beat you in getting to the scene first. You’re twenty minutes behind. What took you so long, Romey?”

       “Got a slow start.”

        Alex laughed, and then punched him lightly on his shoulder.

       “Never heard that one from you, buddy”

       “Who found them?”

       “Poor young boy over there, he could not talk yet. I think he’s still in shock. Guard says he works here as a laborer. A hard worker, apparently. Did you know he’s still in high school?”

       Miguel ignored him.

       “According to the guard, all the workers were having their weekly beer night up to 12 am. Then when everybody was drunk, they started to part their ways. Some went home to their families, some went to their barracks over there to sleep. Today was supposed to be a holiday for them all. At 12:18 am, the boy went out to take a leak at the edge of the construction site. That’s when he found them. That’s quite a sight for a sixteen year old, if you ask me. Explains why he looked the way he did when you came. ”

Alex was eight years his senior and was in the homicide department longer than anyone else. He, on the other hand, had only been there for two years. He was first assigned in the traffic management department, then in the drug enforcement group. He served in the NBI as an undercover agent for six and a half years. He even served once in the Women’s Desk when nobody was available because ‘it was Christmas Day’. It was in his career’s last stop that his life started to spin sideways. They were almost at the crime scene now.

       “How bad is it, Alex?”

       “Bad, really bad. Our early morning girlfriend was being kind when she described it on the phone. Lady almost lost her head. Mister Hero was stabbed seventeen times. Damn, those bastards made him a human pin cushion. He bled to death in just a minute. If not for their company IDs, their families would have a hard time identifying them.”

He stopped walking and looked at him.

       “See for yourself.”

       The initial report did not do them justice. Their faces were a gory mess. The heavy bloody rock near the corpses suggested it was dropped on them when they were almost done. The woman’s head would have rolled all the way down to the nearby creek if the remaining flesh was cut too. Her white blouse, soiled and bloodied, was ripped apart and her bra was cut between the cups by a sharp thing. Her short skirt and her panties were found just over her head. The poor guy was almost reduced into ground meat. What did they used to kill him, a jungle bolo?, he thought.

       “Have they found the murder weapon?”, Miguel asked.

       “Not yet. The forensic team is on their way here. They’ll cordon the whole place and do their job.”

       “Good. Alex, what do you think of the guard?”

       “He’s a nice guy. Knows how to handle things calmly. And a good coffee maker.”, he offered his cup.

       “Have you noticed his neck? He has scratches and they’re new.”

       “Yeah, I noticed that too. He said it was self – inflicted. He just shaved this morning.”

       “I bet. He’s got blood on his pants and I noticed when you were talking to him before, he kept on looking everywhere. He has all the signs of a killer, buddy. Better keep an eye on him or he’ll surely disappear.”

Gonzalo looked back on him and tried to judge him.

       “Too early to say but they surely are persons of interest as of now. Don’t worry about him. I’ll give our guard friend the special.    that he deserves.”

       A few moments after, the forensics team arrived and performed the standard procedures in safeguarding the whole crime scene from outside contamination. They meticulously searched every inch for evidences that would suggest who the perpetrators were. Thy swabbed her for seminal fluids, took samples of skin cells from her fingertips and found several hair strands in his hands, presumably from her abuser. At the break of dawn, one of the team found the murder weapon further down the creek. It seemed the killer/s tried to get rid of it by throwing it into the water. Luckily, the current was not strong enough to carry it. As for the killer’s fingerprints, they would have to bring it to the lab and hope that the waters did not wash away all of it. Or at least enough of the prints remained for the database search.

       “Our job here is done, for the meantime. How about breakfast, Romey? I know a place famous for their bulalo. My treat. What do you say?”

       “Thanks buddy but I got an appointment today. Besides, it’s my day off, remember?”

       “Appointment, huh?”

        Alex smiled and did not insisted on his invitation anymore. He knew what appointment Miguel was talking about.

       “Still not giving up on her? I see what you’re doing there. Don’t worry about me. I’ll go drag somebody else. Now go get her back, Romero.”, he said as he bid him goodbye.

       Miguel waved back at him. The last three words lingered in the air and brought him memories when he was still with her wife. Get her back. If only it’s as simple as that. Still, he would try. He started his way back home, thinking about the words he would say to her. For fifteen years, he had come face to face with all kinds of criminals but he never feared them. But that was not the case with his wife. Since she left him, there was never a decent conversation between them. In fact, there was never a conversation at all. That’s why he was feeling so nervous about facing her and asking her to come home now. He felt he was overthinking already so he lit a cigarette. He took a drag of it and held it for a while before blowing it out. The early tropical breeze started to blow and made the collar of his polo shirt stick to his neck. He decided he really needed a long cold shower. Besides, he has to be in his best before showing up at Nadia’s place.

       When he got home at a quarter before nine, the first thing he did was check his hidden front door key under the mat. Fortunately, it was still there. He went inside and threw his keys on the table. He pulled his shirt off and took off his pants and sat on the sofa with only his boxer on. The silence that enveloped the entirety of the house made him ponder about things for a while. It seemed strange for him how coming home made him feel the presence and absence of Nadia at the same time. He felt his absence in the simple things like the dusty floor, the growing pile of his white shirts in the laundry basket and most of all, the undeniable smell of cigarette smoke inside the house. How Nadia hated even the faintest scent of it. He smiled at the memory of the last time he lit his cigarette and smoked inside while watching the late-night news. He almost slept outside the house. All the furniture and all the curtains however reminded him of her.

       But out of everything that reminded him of Nadia, it was the indoor and outdoor plants that radiate her presence the most. He remembered how she first brought home a succulent and it became their table’s centerpiece for a week. The next Sunday, she came home with an orchid, its vibrant red flowers proudly budding. That went on until the whole place was filled with ornamental plants. When he first met her, he didn’t see her as a green thumb but time proved him wrong. Now, the least he could do was to ensure Nadia’s babies were all in good condition when she comes back, that is if she ever comes back. The sound of the doorbell brought him back to reality. He stood up and wrapped a towel around his waist. He went to the door and cracked it open, his service firearm tucked behind him. A FedEx delivery man stood outside his door with a package in his hand.

       “FedEx?”

       “Yes sir. Delivery for Mr. Miguel Romero.”

       “Wow! The police department is making a statement by sending the lab results through you now. Did you know they only send these things through our own men? Or through Manong Paco, our own letterman?”

       The delivery man looked at him blankly.

       “Oh, never mind. Give me the acknowledgment receipt and a pen. I still have a date to attend to.”, he winked at the still-wondering delivery man and smiled.

       His smile faded when he read what the paper had to say. He didn’t know what to do or what to say for the package did not seem to be lab results or anything that suggested paper works. It was quite small and it resembled wedding ring cases, only a little bigger. Perhaps, they were another set of evidences gathered from the earlier crime scene. But what surprised him more was that it did not came from the PNP lab. Instead, the receipt bore the name of a man he never knew at all.

       A man who went by the name of Yoel.