Jillian Chantal

This week, the writer of Tuesday Tales are writing to the word prompt Harsh. My main character is in the morgue talking to a murder victim.

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She glanced around and finally noticed an open closet door. Now the dilemma was how she could investigate the area without giving herself away. Broussard paid attention to pretty much everything happening in his morgue so she knew he’d spot her move in that direction.

She sidled over toward the closet with a glance over at Malcolm, hoping he could read her cue.

He clearly understood the assignment. As she heard him say, “What about his clothes? Did you send them all over to forensics? Or do you have any here you can show me anything about? Was there anything that would help ID him?”

Broussard moved to the table near the wall, effectively turning his back on Lu. “I didn’t keep much. Just the socks and underwear. I removed some hairs from there to run the DNA and the tech got some from his head as well. To compare to see if there were any other donors of hair on the body. No results yet, but hopefully there will be something.”

“And no wallet at all?”

“Nope. Nope. Nothing.”

Lu whispered into the closet. “I’m here to help you. You can communicate with me if you want.”

Praying Malcolm would continue to keep the coroner busy, she whispered again. “Please let me know your name. We’re trying hard to find who killed you. Your name will let us learn about you and who might want to hurt you.”

A face eased its way around the corner of the closet door. “My name is Marcus Williams. I don’t know who did this to me.”

“Can you describe the person? Man or woman? Tall? Short? Dark or light hair?”

“No. Nothing. I never saw them. Came up behind me and then I was choking and fighting the person off. Without success as you can see.” He shuddered. “I can’t stand looking at myself that way. I’m hiding here since I don’t know who did this and I’m terrified the person will come back.”

Lu hated to break it to Marcus that he didn’t need to be afraid of anyone ever again. The worst had already happens to him, but she’s talked to enough spirits to know they were sometimes not ready to hear harsh truths so close to their time of death.

“Okay. You can stay there with no problem. But do you remember where you were found? Did you see the person who did this when your spirit rose?” She didn’t want to say “left your body” as that was kind of harsh too.

“I saw the person but they had on a bulky jacket. One of those with the puffy stuff. The person also had on a balaclava and hood. I wouldn’t know them again if they walked in here. That’s what scares me.”