New Untitled Project

I saw a prompt today that said to pick up the closest book to you, turn to page 49 and use the first sentence as a prompt. The sentence was: He refused to answer any more of my questions. Thanks Joe! This started out to be a flash fiction piece, but I had too many ideas so it’s slowly becoming a short story. I don’t really know what genre this will end up in because some of the thoughts I have for it could go a few different directions. Either way, I haven’t written a true short story in ages so I’m happy. Hopefully this will go as well as I think it will. What I’m posting is the beginning. As always, I must warn you that it’s a rough draft, and my first drafts tend to lack in description. Feel free to give me any suggestions.

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“He came home smelling like her, so I told him I knew he was cheating. That really did happen.”

“I believe you Angelica,” Tony assured her, as he sat at the side of her hospital bed.

“He told me to calm down, so I told him I would hunt her down and beat her up. I wish that were true.”

“So you didn’t say that?” The woman shook her head. He couldn’t help but notice that her long hair was so filthy he wasn’t quite sure if it was blonde or brown. “What happened next?”

“He refused to answer any more of my questions, so I punched him in the face, but that only happened in my imagination.”

The man raised an eyebrow and made a notation on the yellow legal pad on his lap.

“Before he closed down, everything he said was a lie, so I left him. In my daydreams.”

“So you didn’t threaten to leave?”

“No, of course not. When he went to bed, I killed him. Too bad that didn’t really happen, but I did kill her.” Her eyes unfocused and she stared off into the corner.

Tony’s gaze was drawn to her wrists. They were wrapped in bandages. The report said she tried to kill herself, almost succeeding. What the hell was going on here, he wondered. This was the third time he’d questioned her. Each story she told was different, yet somehow similar.

The first time he spoke with her, she claimed her boyfriend had accused her of cheating. In the second, she said her best friend tried to kill her, thinking that Angelica tried to steal her boyfriend. Every time, she said, or implied that half of what she said was not true. He waved a hand in front of her and got not response so he left her room and headed to the elevator.

He had no idea what the truth was but in each of her interviews, she claimed someone was dead. So far they hadn’t found any bodies, but he had a hunch they would before it was all over. He sighed. This would be a long drawn out investigation. He supposed this was the first dose of the punishment the chief had promised him. Well, at least he still had a job after the fiasco of the last case.