Authors: Jack Parker
Lisa sighed. "Collin, meet Randy."
"R…Randy?!"
"Oh, so
you're
Collin, huh?" Randy said as he stared down at the teenager. "Lisa's mentioned you almost every time we've talked on the phone the past few weeks. She says you're being a nuisance."
Collin gasped quietly and looked up at Lisa, who gave him the same glare Randy was. "Well, you
have
been. Anyway, Randy…what do you want?"
"I told you. I'm straightening everything out. I'm getting my name cleared. I've had enough."
"You're taking this too seriously. I told you, no one thinks you…"
"I don't care what anyone thinks. I've been getting bugged about this every day for the past few weeks, and I'm gonna prove that I've gotten nothing to do with Scott's death. And once I prove that, I'm gonna rub it in the police's fat faces all the way back to Marvelton."
Lisa DATED this guy?
Collin thought to himself, already getting a bad first impression.
"Randy, everything's going to be fine."
"I know everything's gonna be fine. That's why I'm here-so I can get these stupid police out of my hair."
Randy started walking loudly into headquarters without even looking at either of them. As he slammed the door behind him, Lisa sighed, exasperated, and walked in after him. Collin, not knowing what else to do, decided to enter as well.
As he walked in, he saw Randy staring at the place with his hands on his hips and taking a good look around the entire room.
"Haven't changed this place a bit, huh, Lees?" he asked rhetorically. "You coulda put pictures up or something."
Lisa didn't say anything to respond to that. Instead, she just sighed and walked out of the room. Just as she opened up the door, Randy turned to her and called, "Hey!"
She stopped and turned her attention back to him.
"Hey, I know it seems weird to be asking this now, but…you and me…you think there's any way we could…"
"No, Randy," she quickly said. "I'm sorry, but we're over and done with. I mean it."
Without even saying another word, she turned back around and walked out of the building, leaving Randy and Collin alone together.
Collin could tell just from Randy's face that he was furious, and he decided against going up to Randy and asking him questions about what he knew about the murder right away. Instead, he just turned around and simply walked out of headquarters as well.
"Sheesh, that guy didn't sound very friendly," he said to himself as he started marching back to his post.
* * *
Collin continued doing his maintenance work during the day, from picking up trash to talking to campers who were busy annoying others. But the entire time he did this, he was preoccupied. Now that he had someone new to talk to, all he could think about were the questions he would ask Randy and how he would go about asking those. As he bounced ideas back and forth in his head, he became all the more serious about confronting him.
Finally, when
a
few hours passed and Collin saw Randy sitting with Lisa in the break room, he took a deep breath and began approaching. When he made it to the room, he nervously walked in but refused to stop making eye contact with Randy the whole time.
"Uh…hi," he timidly said.
Lisa must have already figured out what Collin was going to do, because she nervously looked at Randy and excused herself from the room, only to walk out of the room in a hurry.
"What do you want, Connor?"
"Uh…my name's Collin."
"Just tell me what the hell you want so I can get back to doing important stuff."
Oh, like trying to get Lisa to hook back up with you?
"Actually, I wanted to ask you a few things about Scott and how he died."
"No."
"Why not?"
"You're a
kid
! I don't have to answer to
you
! Listen, I only waste my time and breath with the guys in law enforcement, all right? So turn around and get outta my face."
Collin clenched his fists but tried to remain cool. In
a
snobby way, he smiled and reached into his pocket and pulled out the police badge that Teneire had given him-the same one that had helped him gain access to the evidence room.
"Oh yeah? What do you call
this
?"
Randy stared dumbfounded at the badge for several seconds before he demanded, "Gimme that!"
Still keeping the snide look on his face, Collin handed the badge over to Randy and watched him examine it very closely to make sure it was authentic. After several seconds, he scowled and handed the badge back.
"Well, maybe you got a badge, but you're still a kid, and I don't have to tell you nothing."
"Want me to get the other police down here? I'm sure they'll REALLY leave you alone if they found out you were being difficult with one of their workers."
Now looking even more infuriated, Randy slammed both his hands down on the table and looked directly at Collin. "Fine. Ask me whatever you want. But make it snappy!"
Wow…I am GOOD!
, Collin praised himself. He couldn't help but grin over his small victory over Randy. "All right. Uh…would you happen to remember off the top of your head who was working on the night Scott died?"
"No one," he instantly answered.
"Huh? No one?"
"That's right. Absolutely no one was working that night. Work
records
even say so. Check'em if you don't believe me."
"Uh…I've already seen them, actually."
Randy slammed his hands down on the table again, this time louder than before. "Then what the hell are ya asking me for?!"
"Because!...well, the log book says someone put in an entry a short while before Scott got killed. And the entry was typed, so we couldn't do a handwriting analysis to figure out who it was…"
"Heh. I don't know what to tell ya."
"Huh?"
"The records don't lie. No one was there that night, all right? No one!"
"But…then who could've…"
"I don't know! I guess it musta been a
camper
. Heh. Good luck finding out which one it was. Tell the fuzz to have fun looking through all the records here and seeing which campers were here then, 'cause those are the only guys I think it coulda been. I just don't care."
That last sentence triggered a response in Collin. "What do you mean, 'you don't care'? I thought you said you wanted this thing to get solved so everyone'll leave you alone about it."
"Yeah, I want
that
, but I don't care really."
Do you care or NOT?!
"I'm confused."
"Look, having peace of mind is great and all, but I really don't care if no one ever finds out who killed Scott. I really don't."
Collin was taken aback by that. "You don't
care
?!"
"What are ya, a parrot?"
"That's pretty cold blooded of you to say, sir."
"Oh, so you want me to lie and say, 'Oh, I hope we find whoever killed poor Scotty! Let's make him feel really bad about it and see him break down in court and listen to him say how sorry he is even though he doesn't give a shit!"
Collin was now speechless. "Well, whatever. This thing is gonna get figured out, whether you want it to or not. I promise you that."
"Yeah, yeah. Just remember that Scott was dead when I got into work a few hours later. All right? I had nothin' to do with it!"
Looking for an Edge
"Sir, I finally got to talk one-on-one with Randy today," Collin said as he pressed his hands at the front of Teneire's desk.
Collin's shift at Arbur Winslow had just ended and he had spent the entire day trying to figure out how Randy could have been connected to Scott's death. Unfortunately for him, he ended the day with no clearer idea than he did before he met Randy, but he thought he knew
a
way that could potentially bring more information to the light.
"And?" Teneire asked.
"I'm thinking we should bring
him
in for questioning. I think we've got everyone else who was working when Scott died."
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"Think about it: Nick, Ian, Jess, Lisa…none of those guys were much help. But Randy's the boss and he probably knows more than they do. And sir, I
really
think he knows more than he's letting me in on."
Teneire looked at him with a blank stare and shook his head. He crossed his arms and, in an almost disappointed tone, he said, "Collin?"
Collin instantly snapped to attention and seemed completely serious. "What is it, sir?"
"Let me ask you something: how much investigating have you done so far?"
"How much have I investigated? Uh…I guess ever since I started trying to figure this out. Why?"
"No, no, that's not investigating."
"What are you talking about?! I'm digging deep to learn what happened, aren't I? Isn't that investigating?!"
"Collin, all you've done is talk to other people and you brought them here for me to question."
"Hey, I've helped out, too!"
"That sorta depends on what your definition of 'help' is, but like I said, that's it."
"Well, isn't that investigating?"
"No. I told you, that's just
talking
to people. I have yet to see you do one bit of investigation outside of this department building."
Collin's face was plastered with confusion. "I'm…really not sure I get what you're saying."
Teneire sighed. "You have any idea what
a
real murder is about?"
"
What
?!"
"Do you know what a real murder is really about? To me, anyway."
"Uh…someone killing somebody else?"
Teneire let out another sigh. "No. That's only what triggers it."
"Uh…I…you're not making any sense!...sir."
"Let me put it this way: of all the murders I've dealt with, the killing itself has
never
been what it's all been about."