Funeral for a Friend
The week was hectic, but also seemed to creep slowly as Steven, Sarah, Ashley and Matt stayed at the hotel.
It began, in the pre-dawn hours of their first night at the hotel, when Steven and Sarah decided to invite Ashley and Matt to come stay with them in New England. Ashley and Matt each protested, for a number of different reasons.
Matt’s reasons were more financial-based. Ashley’s reasons, on the other hand, were more emotional-based. She began her argument for staying in Louisiana with the same excuses Matt used. “I’ve made my career here,” she said. “I plan to try to transfer to another hospital, to get away from Henry, but I didn’t plan to leave Louisiana. I just don’t know.”
However, as she continued to protest her true reasons for wanting to stay began to surface until she finally just admitted, “Look, my career is highly mobile. As a registered nurse, I know that I could basically move to any country in the U.S., not to mention any third world country for that matter, and land a good nursing job inside a week.”
“So then what’s the problem Ashley?” Steven asked, no, pleaded with her. “How many times do I have to tell you, our lives could be in danger.”
“My apartment, I could live without,” Ashley continued. “But what would we do with Mom and Dad’s house? I don’t know what sort of attachments you have formed, but for me, their house is a special place. It’s where I was raised. It’s part of who I am. We can’t just put it up for sale and leave. I’ve got a load of unresolved issues that I’m going to need closure to. And part of what will help with that is their house. I can’t believe you could even consider just stripping it clean, tossing out all their stuff, and just moving.”
“I never said anything about tossing out any of their things or selling the house,” Steven said.
“That’s what would have to happen if I just picked up my life and left,” Ashley said.
“Not necessarily,” Sarah said. “Look, you guys could just board the place up. Call the utility companies, have them shut things down while you guys are in New England with Steven and I. People with summer homes in different states do it all the time. The house would still be there any time you needed it to help you sort things out Ashley.
Ashley nodded
“Look,” Sarah said. “At this stage of things you don’t really need to be alone. I lost my own father several years ago, quite suddenly.”
Sarah pause and the room seemed to grow even more still and silent.
For reasons he was not quite sure of, Sarah’s mention of her own father unnerved Steven a lot. Over the course of their relationship, Steven could basically count on one hand the number of times Sarah mentioned her parents.
In fact, Sarah hadn’t even mentioned her parents for the first few months of their relationship, until one night, while on a dinner date, Sarah’s phone rang. She had just glanced at the caller ID, muttered, “Oh it’s just my mother,” and resumed her previous conversation with him without skipping a t»eat.
Steven had laughed at her, shaking his head, and when she asked him what was so funny he’d replied, “I didn’t even know you had parents until just now.”
Sarah’s reply?
“What?” she asked him. “Do you think I was genetically spawned in some government laboratory in New Mexico or something?”
“No,” Steven answered her. “It’s just that, up to this point you’ve never mentioned them to me.”
As their relationship evolved, he eventually learned the reasons why. Sarah’s parents had been divorced when she was still fairly young. She described her father, on more than one occasion, as a “cheating asshole” who made her mother’s life a living hell until she finally dumped him. However, being a daughter who did, in fact, love her parents despite their irreconcilable differences, she refused to pass any hard judgment on ether of them.
There were other times when she described her father, a lot more lightheartedly, as a merely bumbling dufus who just couldn’t seem to reign in his sexual desires.
“It’s embarrassing,” she’d once told him. “He can’t keep all his girlfriend’s straight. It got to the point where it was so bad, he eventually told all of them about each other. The one’s who couldn’t deal with sharing dropped him. Surprisingly, he still about four or five girlfriends left who didn’t mind about the others. I even think he had a three-way thing going with two of them for a while.”
Eventually, the lifestyle, or more accurately, the stress involved with such a lifestyle must have gotten to him and he’d died of a stroke brought on by high blood pressure.
Sarah’s mother was another story. She was a screenwriter who worked most of her adult life in the film industry in Los Angeles. Half hippie and half serious Hollywood career woman, Sarah often described her mother as a giant ball of walking contradictions.
“She eats granola, smokes pot and likes to walk barefoot in the wilderness near Bakersfield, but at the same time she drives a Porsche 911, shops at Neiman Marcus and is the biggest prima donna I’ve ever met in my life,” Sarah said once, describing her mother.
Steven actually met her mother, when he and Sarah went to Los Angeles for a week early in their relationship. Sarah had a software convention to attend in Silicon Valley and Steven was more than smitten with the idea of “going west” to see the stars and soak up the L.A. vibe.
No. While the topic of her parents wasn’t off-limits, Sarah, who was wildly independent and strong, didn’t mention them too often. As a result, Steven was surprised that morning in the hotel room when she mentioned her father.
She continued talking to Ashley.
“I know how much of a mess I was at the time,” Sarah said. “I was living alone, away from home at the time he died. I went home for the funeral, but went back to Oregon, where I was going to school, almost right after. I spiraled into a pretty steep depression ad there was no one there for me. I don’t want you to have to go through what I went through Ashley. Yes, there is still going to be pain, and yes, there is still going to be grief, but at least if you’re with us, you won’t be alone.”
All said, it was a very convincing argument and Steven, who couldn’t even form any words, finally just nodded his head in agreement and said, “Yeah, what she said,” while pointing at Sarah. Ashley then hugged Sarah and thanked her, but paused as she bit her lip hesitantly.
“It looks like you wanna say something, sis,” Steven said. “What is it? Is there something else?”
Finally, Ashley sighed and then nodded.
“I’ve thought about it Steven,” Ashley said. “I think there arc still holes in the story. What if that bottle wasn’t placed in Mom and Dad’s rental car by someone? What if it is just what you thought it was, a leftover from the last person who rented the car?”
“Then who do you think bought me the drink at Ray’s?” Steven asked her.
“Look,” she replied. “I believe you. And I believe you believe it all too. But what if you’re mistaken? There are a lot of things you mentioned that could just be chalked up to coincidence. There are holes in your story Steven.”
“Holes,” he said, exasperated. “Steven, sweetie, hear your sister out,” Sarah said, gently squeezing his hand.
“Just think of me as another set of eyes and ears,” Ashley said.
“Okay,” Steven said, reclining in the chair, parting the curtains open slightly gently with his hands, but not actually standing up or craning his neck to look outside at the parking lot. There was a part of him, he imagined, that was afraid to actually look. He was afraid, terrified actually, of what he might find there.
“So you think there are holes in my story,” he said, exhaling sharply. “I can live with that.”
“Well first of all,” Ashley began, wasting no time. “The night you guys drove past Lester’s house. Did you actually see a body being hauled out?”
Matt’s head snapped to attention, as if he were being lulled from a deep sleep. His eyes were instantly open and alert, and he looked rather maniacal under the dimmed, artificial light of their hotel room.
“This time Ashley’s right,” Matt said, as he turned to Steven. “Think about it, we never did see them roll a body out.”
Ashley nodded.
“Just the mere presence of the coroner’s office van doesn’t necessarily mean anything either,” Ashley said. “In Louisiana, the coroner is also responsible for dealing with suicide and overdose attempts as well as loony cases. I mean, what if this Lester guy was just that, a paranoid schizophrenic. He saw you and recognized you and then just dragged you into his weird little world of conspiracies. I mean, is that totally beyond the realm of possibility?”
Matt considered this ruefully while Steven nodded.
“It’s not beyond the realm of possibility, I guess,” Steven finally admitted. “But it just seems weird there are so many other things going on, that are below the surface, that we don’t know. I don’t want to think Mom and Dad were murdered any more than you do. But…”
Steven paused and suddenly realized something.
“That reporter girl, the one who works for Ken, Jennifer was her name” he exclaimed. “She was there when we drove by. In the morning, I can call Ken and try to find out what the scoop there is.”
They agreed it was as good a place as any to begin. Ashley and Matt also agreed, eventually, on that night, that if Lester was, in fact, dead, then they would both come with Steven and Sarah to New England.
On the morning of the second day, Steven woke and drove his sister’s car to the newspaper’s office. Steven arrived at the newspaper shortly after ten. He went to the front desk and Ken buzzed him through, back to the newsroom.
Steven had no idea how to explain to Ken why he needed information on either Lester or the fire at the post office, so he decided to just mention Lester, but under the pretense of wanting to pick up some extra copies of the newspaper with his parents obituaries.
Casually, after Ken had slipped him about nine copies of that edition, Steven quickly said, “You know I thought I saw Jennifer the other night in that subdivision behind the old National grocery store.”
Jennifer, who was walking by to pick up a press release off the fax machine, heard and paused for a moment, near Steven and Ken. Ken looked momentarily confused so Jennifer said, “Oh yeah, the suicide, remember Ken.”
“Oh yeah,” he said, looking at her and then at Steven. “Right up your alley, he was Vietnam veteran I think. We got his obit this morning. Apparently, he has no friends or family. Not a single relative. Talk about weird. I don’t think I’ve ever seen an obit before where the dead person didn’t have at least one surviving family member.”
“The weird thing was all the cop cars that were there,” Jennifer said. “I’ve never seen that many cop cars at a suicide. Sure they may arrive at first en masse, but about half of those who respond usually leave in a half hour or so.”
“What are the cops telling you guys?” Steven asked.
“On the record, the usual crap,” Ken said. “You know the drill, the investigation is ongoing, autopsy results are pending…they’ve said the guy had a long history of mental illness, which may or may not be a result of his service in Vietnam.”
“What about off the record?” Steven asked.
“Off the record?” Ken asked. “You tell him Jennifer.”
“I talked to one of the cops that I know pretty good,” she said. “He was at the scene. He said it looked like the guy downed a fifth of Jack Daniels and then blew his brains out with a pistol. But then, he added, that there were a few logistical things that were still bugging investigators at the scene.”
“Did he say what those were?” Steven asked, his heart skipping a beat with the mention of the Jack Daniels. Steven also remembered how Lester knew he was going to die and that it would probably look like an accident or suicide.
“No,” Jennifer said. “I tried to pry it out of him, but he wouldn’t budge.”
“Coroner hasn’t made a ruling on cause and manner of death yet?” Steven asked.
“Nope,” replied Ken and Jennifer, almost in unison.
Steven departed shortly after, but drove past Lester’s house before driving back to the hotel. There were no cars present, but the yellow crime scene tape was still laid out across the front door and front windows and as he made his way back to the hotel, Steven began to form the beginnings of a plan.
Later that day, Steven consulted with Ridley on a few issues regarding bills and their parents estate. Ashley and Matt also contacted their respective landlords, as agreed, and gave their vacancy notices.
Steven had told everyone what he discovered from Ken, which was enough to scare both of them into wanting to leave town. The third day was spent packing, first at Matt’s and then at Ashley’s. When they arrived at Ashley’s, they discovered a bouquet of flowers, from Henry. Irritated, Matt grabbed them and hauled them out to the apartment complex dumpster with no protest from Ashley.
“Get that shit out of my sight,” she said.
Fortunately, both Matt and Ashley’s apartments had both been furnished. Matt had a lot less to pack, by far, than Ashley did.
Matt noted this with a dismal sigh and said, “I’m not sure what it says about a person when all their worldly possessions can basically be packed up into four boxes.”
Ashley, on the other hand, had a lot of things, including extra furniture for her furnished apartment. Sarah suggested a moving truck, but almost immediately wrote the idea off as a bad one. After filling around ten boxes with her possessions, Ashley finally said, “Look, this is just too much. I hate to see the shipping bill on this. Just toss everything else in the dumpster. Things are just things. I can get new things.”
However, as an alternative, Steven suggested not doing this, but storing what she didn’t want to haul up to New England at their parents house. Ashley agreed and they moved the rest of her things, plus four of the ten boxes they’d packed, there.
That evening, completely exhausted, they all gathered around for beers as Steven began to lay out his plan.
“Allright,” he said. “This is probably not legal, but I think we need to get into Lester’s house.”
This statement shut everyone up, until Matt shook his head and said, “No way dude. I’m not going to break and enter into a crime scene.”
Steven just raised his hand and said, “Wait, just hear me out.”
Slowly he began to relay a list of things they should try to do before leaving town. First, before breaking and entering, he asked Matt and Sarah to attend Lester’s services, which were being held at a small Presbyterian church near Fremeaux Avenue. Apparently, some local veterans groups took an interest in Lester’s death, more probably out of sympathy than anything else, because Lester had no apparent family.
“Ken was interested in this,” Steven told them. “I’d like to go to the funeral but I don’t want to go in, where the services are being held, on the off chance that Jennifer or Ken show up. If they see me there, there will be questions asked that I don’t want to be in a position to have to answer- especially if we break into Lester’s house later on down the line. Ashley could be recognized too. No one from the paper knows you or Matt though,” he said to Sarah.
“What are we going to do while we’re there?” Matt asked.
“Look for anything suspicious,” Steven said.
“What if the…killer shows up?” Matt asked. “I’m not sure what to call him, so I guess killer is as good as anything else.”
“I kind of doubt he will,” Steven said. “But Ashley and I will be nearby, outside. I want to record everyone who goes into the church and get plate numbers off all the vehicles.”
“You mean just in case the killer does decide to show,” Ashley said. “That’s real big of you to put your fiancee and best friend into a dangerous situation.”
“Newsflash,” Steven said. “I think we’re already in a dangerous situation. And no, I said I don’t think the killer will show.”
“Then what is it honey?” Sarah asked him.
“My hope is that someone Lester served with besides the killer and besides, whoever I was in my past life will show up,” Steven said. “I just want to see who shows up. Like I said, I’ll film everyone coming in and going out. What I want you and Sarah to do, once you’re in and everyone kind of stops trickling in. I’ll need you guys to copy all the names off the guest book.”
“Hold on a second,” Ashley said. “You said that Ken and Jennifer said the cops told them they were unsure about a few things. What if the cops are there too, doing the same thing, staking out the guests, looking for a killer?”
“Shit,” Steven said. “I didn’t think of that.”
“I still don’t think that would really be a problem,” Sarah said. “As long s Matt and I are together, we’ll look like a couple. I can’t see the cops inquiring too much about us even if they are there.”
“The list is important though,” Steven said.
“Do you know who or what you’re looking for exactly?” Matt asked.
“I don’t know, maybe a name,” Steven said. “I’ve had these flashes now for years. Maybe if I see something it will set off a bell.”
Ashley lit a smoke and said, “You know, if everything Lester told you about who you were in your past life, or where he was, what part of some covert unit…Ashley paused for a moment. “They wouldn’t use their real names would they?” she asked. “And the numbers he gave you, what were they?”
“Third battalion, 21st Infantry unit,” Steven said. “But you’re right, he said I would never find that through proper military channels.”
“Which also means anyone at the funeral, from the military, they won’t be wearing a Third battalion, 21st Infantry unit badge or patch,” Matt said.
Lester Bradshaw’s funeral services were brief and to the point.
As planned. Matt and Sarah attended the services while Steven and Ashley watched the small procession of people file into the church from a rental car parked a half block away.
It did not appear as if the police had attended the services. If they had, they were very slick about it. This led Steven to believe that any questions about logistics had been cleared up and the police had enough to believe Lester’s death was a simple suicide. Except for Matt and Sarah, everyone else who attended was older and appeared to be
from the local VFW group. Regardless, near the end of the brief ceremony, Sarah stepped
away and quickly hand copied all the names from the guest book.
Matt took things one step further. Surprisingly, the funeral home people had
done such a good job of rebuilding Lester, that his services were open casket. As everyone departed from the room, and filed out of the church. Matt was able to snap off a few quick pictures of Lester as he laid in rest.
Steven video-taped the comings and goings of those who attended with a cam-corder they bought the day before at a nearby Circuit City. Once back at the hotel, they
watched the video-footage that Ashley and Steven shot, but did not happen across anyone
or anything that looked odd or out of place.
Although the pictures from Matt’s digital camera had not been downloaded and
opened yet, everyone was sure nothing more would be found.
The following morning Steven and Matt woke early and drove downtown to the library and Clerk of Court office.
At the clerk’s s office Steven ran a civil and criminal search on the name
Lester Bradshaw. For all intents and purposes, it appeared as if Lester Bradshaw had basically kept his nose clean, with the exception of an old speeding ticket.
From the record, Steven noted the make and the model of the vehicle Lester was driving in when he got the ticket, a 1999 Ford F-150 with Louisiana plate RELYT68 The
search also yielded a Social Security number for Lester, which had been issued in
Louisiana.
For a reason he couldn’t quite pinpoint, this seemingly routine information bugged
Steven, until he realized why.
“Do you remember seeing a truck at Lester’s house that night?” he asked.
“No,” Matt said.
“Then where was his truck?” Steven asked.
“What if he sold it?” Matt asked. “He certainly wasn’t driving it. One thing for sure is that the guy I saw at the services was definitely the guy from the donut shop. There is no question about that.
Information from the ticket also listed a driver’s license number, gave Lester’s middle name as Lionel and listed his date of birth as September 23, 1951.
The only civil file on record was an act of donation, for the 8th Street property After discovering the file was stored in the archives, Steven and Matt went down to the basement to check it out.
The transfer of the house and property had been carried out back in 1972. The donation was listed as having been donated by Lester Bradshaw to an “unnamed party”.
“Is that possible?” Matt asked. “Can they do that?”
“1 don’t think so,” he said. “Even if the house is owned straight up, somebody has to be paying property taxes.”
Steven quickly exited the Clerk’s menu on a nearby computer and logged onto the tax assessor s database. Records there, however, indicated that Lester Bradshaw had in fact been paying property taxes on the house for at least ten years, which was as far back as the assessor’s database went.
“Why would he donate the property to an unspecified party, but keep paying taxes on it,” Matt asked, literally scratching his head. “That just doesn’t make any fucking sense.”
Suddenly, Steven’s eyes lit up and he exited the assessor’s database and returned to the clerk’s database, specifically to birth and death records. He typed in Lester’s name and found no death records.
“He just died,” Matt said. “They probably don’t have it on file yet.”
Steven typed in another phrase and hit the return button on the keyboard. This time a birth record for Lester Lionel Bradshaw flashed onto the screen. This birth information was different, though, from what Steven and Matt had found from the information listed from the speeding ticket.
According to the birth record, Lester Lionel Bradshaw was born in 1902, not 1951.
“What the fuck does that mean?” Matt asked.
“I think it means something happened,” Steven said. “Because, correct me if I’m
wrong, but the Lester Bradshaw who just died, could not have been born in 1902.”
“You’re not wrong,” Matt said. “There is no way the dude could have been born in 1901. That would make him over a hundred.”
They left the clerk’s office and arrived at the public library a short time later, to continue the search.
Steven logged onto the Internet and Matt just shook his head.
Unsure what to make of this, Steven ignored him and performed a few routine Google searches on Lester Bradshaw, but did not get any hits.
“Son of a bitch, that’s what he did,” Steven said, but when he turned around, he found
Matt was gone.
Eventually, Steven found Matt sitting outside the library sipping a Sprite and smoking a cigarette.
“So did you find anything else out in there?” Matt asked.
“I think I know what happened,” Steven said.
Matt nodded.
“I think there was a Lester Bradshaw. And, I believe he was born in 1902 just like the birth certificate said,” Steven said.
“So, what about our Lester, he one who just croaked?” Matt asked.
“He wasn’t Lester Bradshaw,” Steven said. “I think that when the old Lester died our guy assumed his identity.”
“So we’re back at square one,” Matt said. “Can I tell you how much I don’t want to break into this guy’s house?”
“We might not have to,” Steven said.
They returned to the hotel and met up with Sarah and Ashley, who had been checking out names on the guest list. Sarah and Ashley said they’d found nothing. Sarah then removed her laptop from a carrying case and then set it up on the hotel room table. Steven, in turn, told them about the two separate records he and Matt had discovered, along with his theory of “Lester” stealing Lester’s identity.
“I want to download the pictures Matt took last night,” she said.
Matt faced Ashley and leaned over and hugged her, and she returned a quick kiss,
smiling at him.
Steven, meanwhile, was sitting on the bed reviewing the tape he and Ashley had shot the night before. He rewound to the beginning and then slowly forwarded it. Matt peered over his shoulder and asked him what he was up to.
“Something I missed,” Steven said. “I didn’t think it was a big deal because everyone was leaving, but now I wonder…” His voice trailed off. “Ahha,” Steven said.
Steven froze the frame. There, just as all the old VFW guys had piled out, even after Matt and Sarah walked out, a small elderly lady quietly walked up the steps from the left and entered the church.
“Son of a bitch, I didn’t even see her there last night,” Matt said
Steven froze the tape again and began to rewind it, in an effort to see where she came from. It was almost as if she had just materialized from thin air, but Steven saw where she came from, a small white car. He froze the rear end of the vehicle before she had climbed out.
“Sarah,” he said.
Sarah looked up from the download she was in the middle of.
“Is there any way you can blow this up to zoom in on the license number,” he asked.
“Hold on a sec,” she said. “I’m trying to open these pictures. Probably ”
“We don’t need the license plate,” Matt said. “I know that car. It’s from next door
to Lester’s house. She’s his neighbor, she was standing outside that night the police were there.
“Are you sure?” Ashley asked him.
“I’m positive,” he replied.
Suddenly Sarah gasped and stood up from her seat at the table, taking a step or two back from the laptop
“What is it honey?” Steven asked her. “Did Matt get something”
Her eyes were wide with horror though and she still held her hand over her mouth as if to stifle a scream. Steven leaned over and looked at the screen. There was the coffin. There was Lester. But just off to the left was something else, a shadow of a very large figure. It looked like it was half man and half swirling mists. It appeared to be floating overhead, just feet away from the coffin.
One by one, they all looked at it.
“Could this possibly just be a camera fuckup?” Matt asked
But he knew the answer to the question already
“That’s no fuckup,” Sarah said. “That. That’s a ghost. Very ominous and very. ”
“Threatening,” Matt said. “That’s what it felt like when I was taking the pictures. I was nervous, you know, because I didn’t want to get busted taking pictures of the corpse. But all of a sudden I felt like there was someone, or something was in there with me. It
felt so real I actually looked around to make sure no one had walked in. I figured I was just getting creeped out from Lester there…but…..Holy shit ”
They all continued to stare in disbelief at the image
“That’s him” Steven said.
“Who?’ Ashley asked.
“That’s the thing that chased us out of the woods that day,” Matt said.
