Hello, Little Sparrow by Jordan Jones (the reading list .TXT) 📕

pixels, making an ID impossible. Brooks couldn’t believe he was getting a behind-the-scenes look at his own investigation…in his own living room.

“Kinda difficult to make anything out. Are you sure that’s a person?”

“That’s an employment kiosk,” Morelli interjected. “Of course it’s a person. They get up and walk back out the door they came in.”

“I’m sorry, but it looks like a black blob. Is this the guy that did it?”

“We don’t really know,” Draper said. “That’s really all we can tell you. We were hoping you’d tell us something we didn’t know. Was there anyone else she was close with? This was a pretty personal murder. Maybe she wronged someone — owed them something?”

She did owe someone something. She owed society everything. She had inside knowledge of how a monster operates and dismissed it as if nothing had happened. She didn’t struggle like she should have. Her fears weren’t centered on those who did her harm. She should’ve been right there with Brooks as he killed Philip, cowering on the floor.

“She had a lot of different boyfriends growing up,” Brooks answered. “I do know that. She was into meth pretty bad — I think that’s why she was locked up. Maybe she didn’t pay up before she was incarcerated and they came after the fact?”

“Maybe…” Draper said, unconvinced. “They waited for three years for her to leave prison; why couldn’t they wait three more months until she was out of rehab to kill her in seclusion?”

Because, when the feelings become too overwhelming, there’s not much else I can do to appease them, Brooks thought.

Brooks shrugged, unable to give the officer an answer.

“We’ll have to look into this Tommy Roisman to see if he’s real. We’ll check with any known boyfriends before she was locked up. Maybe a drug dealer or two. Maybe it was a hit, but hitmen usually don’t take this risky of an approach.”

“I’m sorry, gentlemen. I wish I could be of more help, I really do.”

“Something will come up,” Morelli said, eyeing Brooks from the mantel. “It always does.”

The men left and pulled out of the driveway.

Brooks felt that uneasy feeling back in the pit of his stomach. He dared to not deal with an ounce of remorse, because that would be his downfall. The officer lie dead in the city morgue with a bullet wound to the neck. His cousin never rebelled against Brooks’ ethics other than falling in line with society.

Society shared the fault along with the vile.

Brooks wondered how many people were left that lived virtuous lives, because he only saw virtue in his imaginary family members and Madison.

Though she did not speak, he knew her thoughts at all times. She made it that way. She trusted him, and when he was uneasy about following through with a task, she would take his hand and guide him through it. That’s how Madison was virtuous.

Brooks sat back down at the kitchen table and read a newspaper from five years earlier. He acted as if he was getting up-to-date information on the world. The children had calmed down and were coloring on the floor, the dog acting as a distraction for everyone. The wife finished the dishes and washed her hands. She gave Brooks a kiss on the cheek and he didn’t even look up from the paper.

She mentioned something about the children washing up before heading off to school and Brooks would have to quickly finish his coffee before heading off to work as an account executive at a multi-national fortune 500 company specializing in something extremely creative.

Brooks got up and went to the door, waving to the children as they climbed on the bus. The bus pulled off with two honks, he kissed his wife, and then she watched him get in the car. The engine roared and he backed out of the drive and pulled off.

It was a great life to live, untethered by the constant stress of having to keep the vile dead, but the plants alive.

His feet sat parallel on the floor of his living room as he stared where Morelli was at the mantel and felt a brightly lit piece of him fall from his head and smash onto the floor, covering it with dull, grey dust.

***

The sedan pulled into the large parking lot at Fasten Biofuels on the outskirts of town. Brooks’ head throbbed as he replayed every possible scenario in his head all morning long. He made the short drive to his employer with no plan, but wanted to leave with the papers and drawings in his office.

Waiting until Monday was risky, so Brooks changed his mind.

The detectives came and went much like the vile in his life. There would be no way in other than using his proxy; making it obvious he’d been in the building on a weekend.

Then he saw it.

A cleaning company with their logo obnoxiously plastered on the side of their van was pulled up close to the front door of the greenhouse.

The crew was busy inside buffing and waxing the floors. The glass made it easy for Brooks, or anyone, to see what was going on inside.

Brooks walked up to the door after parking far enough away not to cause any suspicion. He brought with him two storage boxes. He knocked on the glass door and a middle-aged woman looked up half-startled.

She turned off the big bulky floor buffer and took out her earbuds.

Brooks flashed his identification and her facial expression relaxed a bit. She unlocked the door and let him in.

“We don’t get many greenhouse workers in here on the weekends,” she said. “The factory is always buzzing, but no one ever comes in here. Did you forget something?”

“Yes,” Brooks said, trying his best to sound convincing. “I left my phone on my desk.” He motioned to