Dark Explorations

I resided in a rented home in Westover, a suburb of Morgantown. It was nice and out of the way and was easily connected to everything if I ever needed to leave in a hurry, which my job frequently required. The door was already unlocked so I walked inside and set my boots by the door. I was immediately greeted by one of my two roommates. She stalked out from behind a corner and began to meow at me. Bast was technically not my cat. This tabby predated me in my roommate’s life yet Bast seems to like me more for some reason. She’s always clawing to get into whatever room I’m in and rubbing on my legs. She voiced her frustration to me for coming home later than usual. Sorry Bast, late day at the office.

She followed me as I entered the living room. The carpeted floor transitioned to tile at the end as it gave way to the kitchen. Another hallway existed between the two areas where the other rooms in the house connected. There was a tv playing an animated show I did not know while my roommate worked on her laptop. Her name is Madison Neill and technically she is also my ex-girlfriend. We had gone to high school together but vaguely knew of each other. She was a sophomore when I was a graduating senior. We met up again around three years ago and things started off well. She’s a lesbian and I’m bisexual in an area of the country where gay pride isn’t the most common thing. It formed a natural bond and we moved in with each other after a few months.

That clearly was a mistake and we found out that we weren’t as compatible as we initially thought. But we had already signed the lease and no one was willing to take it from us. What followed was a game of chicken as we both tried to find someone to take the lease from the other. After months of this, we both gave up and settled into a routine and found a status quo of distant friendship and toleration. She was currently working as an online therapist and was able to pay her half easily which gave me no room to complain about her.

She didn’t look up from her laptop as her eyes glazed over emails or whatever she was doing at the moment. She was dressed in essentially pajamas with a grey spaghetti string top and bright many-colored pair of pajama pants with hair tied into a loose blonde bun with a face framed by blue light glasses. I put my keys on their hook and walked into the kitchen. I usually got off much earlier and could make something at home, but tonight it was nine at night already. I reached the fridge and found some leftover pizza and popped it into the microwave. I was too tired to do much else. It was this action which finally caught Madison’s attention and she looked up from her laptop.

“Everything okay at work?”

Her question was kind of ridiculous if you think about it. In terms of whether everything is running as it should, yes work was okay, just busy. The reality of working in law enforcement meant that the answer to that question was dependent on if you saw someone ruin their life that day or their life ended. Under that assumption of the question, no, work was not okay. I didn’t need to unload that fact upon Madison today and decided to give a respective answer.

“Yeah, just busy.”

She clicked a few buttons on her laptop before closing it. She did a large stretch against the back of the chair which did a nice job of showing off her large chest. I swear I’m not interested in a relationship with her. Yes she’s hot, but she’s a total nutjob. She quickly became obsessive and wanted to fix any perceived ‘problem’ I had. At the time, she wasn’t a therapist and I suspect she was desperate to find a job as one so made me her test subject. We ended up fighting a lot because of that until I finally stormed out one day. I returned the next day realizing I couldn’t just abandon everything here and stay with my parents. We now have this arrangement where I don’t talk to her about my personal life and she won’t give me unrequested advice. That didn’t stop her from asking.

“I saw the news about those kids. Did you need to handle it?”

I shook my head in response.

“Nah, I only had to handle the behind the scenes stuff. Helping the investigation set up and shit.”

The microwaved beeped and I took out the two day old slices of pepperoni and italian sausage. I was vague on purpose with her. If I gave her too much to work with, she would keep asking more questions until she got some drama or an interesting tidbit. She would then tell all her friends and colleagues about it. She seemed somewhat disappointed in my answer and didn’t ask again. I watched as she unplugged her laptop from the charger in the wall and began to pack it up to head to her room. Something Agent Zimmerman said was stuck in my mind and I decided to see another psychology major’s opinion.

“You think a woman could commit a crime like that?”

“What?”

My question shocked Madison for a moment. She stopped what she was doing to stare at me, trying to understand what I had asked. I decided clarification was needed.

“You’re a psych major. You studied this stuff. We were told to suspect a gay man because women don’t commit such gory crimes with a sexual motive. These young men were being fucked while they died. Is it seriously that unrealistic?”

Madison went wide-eyed at my statement. I didn’t remember if it had been reported that the men were sexually assaulted as well as killed, so maybe this was her first time hearing it. Damn it, now she’ll tell her group chats and whoever she last slept with. She seemed to think about it for a moment before answering.

“Well… I’m not a criminal psychologist, mind you. But yeah, men tend to be more violent than women in vague, general terms. That’s a really old and kind of sexist way of thinking, but I guess criminal psychology is a different field. I would never professionally state that opinion. Is the sexism of the statement bothering you? That’s a little out of character.”

It wasn't sexism. I had lived in rural Appalachia most my life, worked in a male dominated field, handled crazy right-wingers constantly as an officer, I had seen far worse so it wasn’t the problem. I scratched the back of my head and stared uncomfortably at the tabletop, trying to think.

“No, it’s not that. Something about this case is bugging me. Like I know something, but can’t figure it out. That fact of the profile just keeps hovering in my mind.”

Madison looked at me a bit worried and made the inevitable offer.

“Samantha, if you need to talk I’m here.”

I shook my head. I didn’t need to be analyzed right now. I needed to eat and go to bed.

“No thanks, I’m good.”

She sighed, but accepted my refusal. She grabbed her belongings and walked off down the hall. Bast sat at the barrier between the room and hall and stared at me. Madison called to her and with a look of disappointment towards me, followed her actual owner. Can’t help you there kitty.