The Inheritance of Shadows

     Hey Tiny Fair! New information just in, and it doesn’t sound good! 

It never does, does it?  It's all like a leaking diaper. 

Dr Jimmy’s father, Jimmy Snr, he was arrested a few years back for impersonating a Doctor, yes a Doctor, inside the hospital, white coat, stethoscope, the full performance, but not for prestige, not for ego, looks like it was for access, narcotics, controlled drugs basically. 

When they caught him it wasn’t just what he had on him, phials, substances, scalpels and hypodermic syringes,  it was what sat waiting outside, a sawn off shotgun, cable ties, a hunting knife, not impulse, not panic, but preparation, intention. Like what the hell? Five years, that’s what he got, five years for something that doesn’t sit neatly inside a sentence. What was the motive? What did he need the stolen stuff for?

Abd Frency, prison doesn’t erase men like that, it doesn't rehabilitate them,  it sharpens them, distills what’s already there. But yes, why did he need the tools? To get rid of his wife is my guess.

So, he gets out of jail, he moves, new place, same man, and then, the body in the Bay. He was less than a minute away from the victim!

A woman, known to him?

Yes! Not random, not chance, she’d been in his home, late night drinks, his wife away, her husband busy at the office... a quiet setting, familiar, almost too familiar, and the next morning? He asks the maid to check for blonde hairs on the furniture.

Not worry.

Not regret.

Erasure. There was a plan, a plot..

He didn’t get her upstairs in his house, well maybe, maybe not, but proximity is enough, familiarity opens doors, no need to break them down.

Then the bar, the last sighting. They were laughing, enjoying the convivial atmosphere.

But now he’s spiralling, he's thrown out by his wife, his constant lies, the unpredictable violence  he can no longer keep contained, he’s in a cheap hotel across from the Bay, weekly rates, no questions asked, people come and go, no one looks twice. People of no discernable character.. Just blank faces to a tired and jaded receptionist who's seen it all before.

One minute from the bar. The hotel.

One minute.

No car, the wife had claimed that, but he didn’t need one, he had the motorbike, red, sparkling clean, visible yet unseen, he knew where she lived, the victim,  knew her movements, knew enough.

Did he lie in wait? 

The attack says something, not clean, not quick, a rock, her face, repeated, personal, excessive, belongings scattered, looks like chaos, looks like theft, but feels wrong, staged, like an afterthought.

She’s found floating, face up, as if even the water wouldn’t hide what had happened,  but something doesn't sit right with me. It's the hand bag. It's her profession (...)

Which was what?

She was a journalist for the Evening Sentinel,  she would have covered the daily court sessions.

But a bit extreme? To kill someone to stop your name appearing in the local rag? Unless there was something else going on.. 

And him? Now in jail for something completely unrelated?

In jail.

Theft, fraud, a chop shop running quietly, eighteen months, just enough, just enough to sit behind a wall when the questions start.

Not a suspect.

Not even considered.

Convenient.

Another man dies in prison, claiming innocence to the end, a neat ending for someone, whether it fits or not.

So now the question, the one that doesn’t go away,

Do the sins of the father run through the son?

Because Dr Jimmy didn’t come from nowhere, none of us do, he watched, he learned, not just blood, behaviour, patterns, quiet lessons in the background.

What did he see?

A man who could become someone else.

A man who wore authority like clothing.

A man who cleaned up, removed traces, avoided consequence.

A man who was never truly caught for the worst thing he may have done.

That doesn’t disappear.

It stays.

It teaches.

So when you look at Dr Jimmy, really look,

Is he creating something new?

Or finishing something that was already in motion?

—End—

But it isn't,  is it?