One
“‘Perhaps the most interesting thing about Herbert Humphrey’s victims is that most of them were never found; and, had he not called in sick to work that day, Humphrey never would have been discovered at all.’”
Bryce read from the script with perfect ease, the black microphone bisecting her features down the middle. With her headphones on and eyes cast down, Thea knew everything else came secondary to her best friend now. She was in the zone. It was about the only time Thea managed to distract her from her usual problems, and she cherished each moment they spent recording down here, in the basement of her mother’s bookstore, paying little heed to anything that existed outside of these dank four walls.
“With a name like Herbert Humphrey, maybe we should’ve expected a few dead bodies.”
It was Thea’s job to lighten the mood; to go off-script and improvise so that listeners ofPerfect Crimes, their weekly independent true-crime podcast, wouldn’t tire of their sinister subject matter too quickly. Not that Thea could imagine anyone tiring of such a thing. Serial killers were like snowflakes: each one had a unique shape, a different mindset and signature, a new way of leaving their victims behind. Herbert Humphrey’s method just so happened to have been ditching the remains in Sal’s Scrapyard, where he worked Monday to Friday in a quaint town only a few hours from Stone Grange, where Thea and Bryce both lived.
“Well, it’s not all that difficult to envision a middle-aged man named Herbert as a little bit of a loner.” Bryce nodded her agreement, though her audience couldn’t see her. With the shoddy, second-hand recording equipment and the less than optimal — but actually quite apt — setting, it was easy to forget that people other than themselveswouldlisten to this conversation. They’d been doing this for so long now that it felt like second nature to talk to each other through microphones, and almost a decade of friendship meant that Thea was comfortable enough around Bryce to slip into her stupid jokes and uninteresting facts. Perhapstoocomfortable, she’d come to wonder recently.
“‘Everybody in town claimed to have had some sort of strange run-in with him at one time or another,’” Bryce continued. “‘Bad vibes, as Thea would say.’”
“‘Serial killer vibes.’” Thea cast a small smirk Bryce’s way. It was returned with the soft, dimpled swells of Bryce’s wan cheeks; Thea’s favorite sight. “‘And indeed, the bad vibes came to fruition. On April 19th, 1999, we now know that Herbert Humphrey claimed his first victim, Judy Carlton. Two weeks later, his second, Simon Lowe. At the time, both of them were declared missing; their bodies never have been found. It was the third that led to Humphrey’s downfall. On May 11th, 1999, a plain old Tuesday in the lazy town of Oakfold, our silly, silly man Humphrey called in sick with a virus.’ A little strange, no?”
Though Thea was too busy reading her scrawled notes to lift her gaze, she could practically hear Bryce rolling her eyes across the table. “Here comes another of Thea’s conspiracies. Maybe we should make a new series for them.”
“Don’t tempt me.” Thea grinned. She’d toyed with the idea plenty of times, but Bryce refused to do it with her. After an infinite amount of puppy-dog eyes, begging, bribes involving extra cheesy fries and ice cream sundaes from Dina’s Diner, Thea had finally given up trying. “But no, I don’t know if I believe he was really sick. We all know that serial killers like to be recognized, famous even, in cases such as these ones. The victims held little connection to Humphrey, if any. They were just unfortunate souls who happened to be easy targets when the killer was ready to strike. So, it begs the question: if Humphrey went to so much work to hide the bodies in the scrapyard, why would he suddenly be careless enough to call in sick the morning after dumping his last victim?”
“Because he got too cocky. He thought he’d hid it well enough,” Bryce answered, ever the logical one.
Thea wrinkled her nose. She didn’t care much for logic. “No. I don’t buy it. The thing is, there were rumors about the third and final victim. Apparently, Humphrey was seen arounda lotwith his last kill, a married mother of two named Laura Adams. Some people even suspected that they were having an affair while Laura’s husband was out of town. Maybe the weight of what he’d done, killing the woman he loved, knocked him sick to his stomach, and that’s why he took a day off. Maybe hedecidedto hang up his knife and end his spree after the last one got too much, too real.”
“I think it would take more than a day to recover from the guilt of murdering your lover,” Bryce countered.
Movement caught Thea’s eye, distracting her from the argument. From his corner desk, Mikey gestured for them to wrap it up with winding fingers. They must have surpassed their forty-five minute mark.
Thea sighed, pressing her lips into a thin line. Tuesday mornings were her favorite day of the week. The basement distanced her from reality, from everything. In these short moments, it was just Bryce and Thea, talking, until everything felt simpler and easier to bear. She was always sad to see it come to an end.
It was also the only place she ever saw Bryce loosen up. Between working long shifts at the arcade six days a week and raising her sixteen-year-old sister, she had a lot on her shoulders. Thea liked knowing that this was the place where that weight could lessen slightly, and that she could be a part of the reason for it. It was the least Bryce deserved.
“Either way,” Thea’s fingers curled around her mic as she brought the episode to a close, “there’s a lesson to be learned here, Bryce.”
“And what’s that?”
“Don’t call in sick the day after you’ve dumped a body at your place of work.”
“I’ll keep it in mind should I ever decide to kill you.”
Thea gasped, a hand pressed to her chest in feigned disgust. “You would never.”
“You keep testing me,” shrugged Bryce. “Stealing my fries, getting me up at seven every Sunday to help you with inventory, having me capture all the spiders in the basement. You’re on thin ice.”
It was true that Thea did those things. Bryce always got her own back, though, by scooping the jam out of Thea’s donuts or forcing her to keep her company at the arcade on slow weekday afternoons. “You signed up for that when you became my best friend.”
Bryce only hummed without commitment, glaring at Mikey, who reeled his fingers more aggressively now. “Well, that’s all we have time for this week, you sick and twisted bunch. Make sure you set a reminder for next week’s episode, where we’ll be talking about an unsolved mystery involving a Jane Doe found drowned in a shallow lake. Thanks for listening.”
“Goodbye, dear friends,” Thea sang as she always did, and then Mikey cast them a thumbs up to let them know the recording had ended. Blowing out a breath, she slid the headphones off her sweaty ears and cracked her knuckles. “That was a fun one, I think.”
Bryce winced at the sound and then glimpsed the time on her phone. “I better go. Gus wants me to open up today.”
“Ugh, Gus.” Thea scoffed at the mention of Bryce’s demanding boss. Usually, Bryce at least had time for a cup of coffee and a browse through the bookstore before she left. “Milkshakes tonight to make up for it?”
With a pause that left her leather jacket suspended on only one arm, Bryce pondered the offer. “And burgers?”
“Ooh, good call. I want double cheese and bacon.”
“Who, me?” Mikey muttered under his breath as he clicked away at his laptop. “Oh, no. I’m busy. Thanks for the invite, though.”