Talked to Death
By
Jeffrey Marks

Lying to the press seemed like a good idea at the time, but not when I found Maggie Parker's body on the bedroom floor of my apartment. The most notorious child killer in Cincinnati's history had met her maker in my home after a daring jail escape. Her body was battered and torn with bruises spreading like patchwork across the face and neck. Someone hadn't been happy to see her. I knew I was in that category even though I'd professed my undying love for her on national television.

"I came all the way here to see you, but, uh, -- Laurie . . ." Her head tilted over on the rug and I didn't need a medical degree to tell she was dead.

Maybe I should explain. My lifelong ambition was to be on one of those trashy talk shows, Jerry or Jenny or whoever else couldn't make it in acting. When my fifteen-year high school reunion notice came in the mail, I decided the time was now or never. If my life wouldn't cooperate by being radically weird, I'd force fit it into the mold like Roseanne in a size 6 dress. I wrote to Mark McKinley, a former actor on a night time soap, now host of a just gone national talk show. He had the honor of being the only actor to be in four of the top ten worst movies of all time, films that made Meatballs look like an Orson Welles' masterpiece. I made up the strangest story I could think of; I was a gay man in love with a convicted killer who happened to be a woman. Don't blame me for it. My lover of the past four years, Brian, thought it up. At least the 'gay man' part had a ring of truth to it.

I had chosen Maggie Parker since she was the most unlovable woman I could think of. She followed her lover from Liverpool, England to Cincinnati and killed her three children in the squalor of Lower Price Hill six years ago before being sentenced to die for her crimes. The city had been aghast at the unloving mother and I decided anyone who would profess any affection for her would be noteworthy.

I was right. Mark contacted me within a week asking me to do the show with a woman who still carried a torch for Ted Bundy and a man who had asked both Lynnette Fromme and Sara Jane Moore to be his bride. I wasn't wild about the company, but hey, a dream's a dream.

The show was everything I'd hoped for. The producers arranged to bring Maggie to the show and sat her next to me where I tried to look at her, as I might long for Brad Pitt. My acting had to be great because years in prison hadn't helped Maggie's pasty complexion, needle nose, or stringy, dishwater blonde hair. I thought the effect worked and Brian professed to being jealous. I was a nine day wonder with my friends, the only person they knew who had the audacity to show their face on the television equivalent of The National Enquirer. One of my friends even tried to fix me up with his sister who had only shot an unarmed police officer. I declined the invitation, saying I would only have men if I couldn't have Maggie. There was no doubt that I had my fifteen minutes of fame, excluding commercial breaks.

I decided that my fame was going to stretch into a life sentence as I surveyed the body now lying on my floor. I wracked my brain, trying to think of women that I knew named Laurie or Laura. I could only think of one, my boyfriend's ex-wife. Had she come over and found another woman waiting here? Would she have assumed Brian had lied about being gay to meet another woman on the side? Laurie hadn't taken the news of her husband's sexuality well, unless throwing pets at him is considered graceful, and Brian had told me more than once how jealous she was.

I felt a sudden wave of guilt as I realized that Maggie wouldn't be dead if I hadn't lied on that talk show. In a sense, I had killed her with my desire to fulfill a fantasy.

A knock at the door interrupted my thoughts. I looked out the peephole at the fisheyed face of Mark McKinley and another man. The altered view didn't help his too tanned face or his scientifically enhanced hair. I panicked at the thought of company with a corpse on the floor. What would Emily Post say? I pulled Parker's body to the hall closet and pushed her inside, pausing to notice the parallel smudges on her blouse. The rug underneath where she had lain was perfectly clean which was good; I was out of carpet cleaner.

I opened the door with a smile on my face that felt as pasted on as a kindergartener's decoration and not as sincere. McKinley pushed past me and looked around the room. "Where is she? Have you done the dirty deed yet? We wanted to take some pictures of it."

I swallowed hard. "You wanted to take pictures?" Some people would do anything to beat Oprah.

I got the glitz smile again. The normal thrill I would have received from seeing a second opportunity at fame wasn't going to appear under these circumstances. "Sure, every newlywed couple wants pictures of their wedding, don't they?"

"Newlywed? Who am I supposed to marry?"

"Maggie Parker, of course. She called me and said you two were going to tie the knot today. That's why she broke out of prison."

I opened the closet door with trepidation, the second time in my life that I had done it. "'Til death do us part came a little early here.”

McKinley stuck his head in the tiny room, a tight fit in his case, and howled. "This is great. Murder always draws better ratings than love stories. Larry, get some film of this."

I looked at the cameraman for the first time. He looked like a reject from the local biker bar, all leather, tattooed muscles, and scruffy hair. He carried the portable camera like a lunchbox.

"Your name is Larry?" I asked gawking at the hair on his chest that stuck out of the ripped T-shirt. I had to look up to see his reaction. A citizen's arrest would definitely be out of the question.

"Yeah, you're in my way, do you mind?" he pushed me aside like tofu at a Jenny Craig meeting and started filming my closet. I sighed, thinking that my abode would be more famous than its occupant.

Mark stuck a recorder in my face. "Why are you so interested in my cameraman? And why did you kill that poor defenseless little creature?"

I looked at him closely and saw more crows' feet than Heckyl and Jeckyl. "She's not a defenseless little creature. She brutally murdered her three children."

"That doesn't sound like someone who's madly in love. Is the honeymoon over all ready?"

"There was never going to be a honeymoon. She's serving a life sentence, remember?" I looked past his shoulder to see Larry bending down over the corpse, one hand on the floor. "What are you doing over there?"

"What's up with you? I didn't kill her."

"Is that why she said 'Laurie' just before she died?" I eyed the man and the door, wondering if I could escape before his oversized form caught up with me.

The big man snorted. "My names not Laurie, its Larry, and besides, Mr. Personality here can vouch for me for the past two hours. We've been filming a ten-car pileup at the nudist colony all morning."

McKinley nodded with a frown. "He's right, but it's a shame we have such an airtight alibi. Otherwise we could get an exclusive with a suspect." He shot a glance at the cameraman.

"Wasn't her daughters name Laurie?" McKinley asked, trying to spice up the story.

I shook my head. "I don't know. I just remember there were two girls and a boy."

"There were two boys and a girl and the girl's name was Lauren after her father's mother." The cameraman turned away and started filming again.

Mark's and my eyes swiveled to look at him. How did he know these things? Just then the door opened and Brian stepped into the room. I didn't have to fake being in love with him. He had a broad chest under a tight-fitting T-shirt and a narrow waist in jeans that could still make me swoon like someone who had watched too many of Mark's movies. He'd just gotten off work as an EMT. I was glad to see him even though it was too late to call this an emergency. "What's going on here?" he asked.

"You remember Mark McKinley from the show, don't you?" I asked as if talk show hosts stopped by all the time.

"Sure, how are you?" Brian stepped forward and extended a hand like Oprah had been here for drinks the other day. The cameraman still blocked the view to the closet and Brian scanned the apartment repeatedly looking for a reason for the visit.

"You must be the best man." Mark turned to look at me. "So you did know all about the jail break?"

"He's not the best man. He's just a friend." I sputtered, wondering how many years I'd get for helping with a jail break.

"That's not what you said last night," Brian said with raised eyebrows.

I poked him in the ribs and whispered, "Last night I didn't know Maggie Parker was going to die in my apartment and say the name 'Laurie' before she bounced out of this mortal coil."

Brian swallowed hard. "Laurie? Are you sure that's what she said? It couldn't have been 'Maury'? Maybe she was angling for another talk show."

"It was definitely Laurie." I was already in enough trouble without changing a dying statement. Maybe they could put Brian and me in the same prison, I thought. The state could save on beds.

"Where is she now?" he asked.

I pointed to the closet. "Over there. I hid her when these two showed up at the door."

Brian took a cautious look over the cameraman's shoulder and leaned down to examine the body. "Looks like she was beat up pretty bad. Probably died of internal bleeding. Where did you find her?"

I pointed to the carpet on the living room floor. "Right here."

Brian bent down and Larry moved behind him, still operating the camera. "There's no bloody carpet here. She must have been moved from where she was beat up."

My mind started racing at his comments. I had forgotten about the woman's past in my rush to clear myself.

"She was hit by a truck," I said smiling which probably wasn't appropriate for a man who had just lost his fiancee.

"Says who?" McKinley asked. I figured elementary school retorts would probably be removed from the tape before it aired.

"It's simple. When Brian started talking about 'the bloody carpet', it reminded me that Parker was British. She wouldn't talk about a truck. The English call it a 'lorry', but that wasn't the way I heard it. I assumed it had to be a girl's name. A truck would do all this damage to a person plus the bumper would leave those smudge marks on her blouse."

"You mean there wasn't a murder?" Now it was McKinley's turn for an inappropriate response.

"No, she was probably in a rush to cross the street and accidentally stepped in front of a truck. She made it up here before the injuries caught up with her."

McKinley straightened his tie and looked at me. "Would you mind saying a few words to the camera about losing your true love? It'll make a great segment for next week."

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