I start with the standard procedure – I walk into the small, tight room with no windows and turn on the small lamp sitting in the middle of a completely clean, shiny, dark brown wooden desk. Everything in this room is designed to make you uncomfortable – the chair is way too small for the table and makes a screeching noise every time you move it, the room is longer than it is wide, there’s an old carpet on the floor that produces a cloud of smoke everytime anybody moves an inch and the lamp starts flickering aggressively 5 minutes and 46 seconds after being turned on. But l've gotten used to it by now. Even so, I still hate this room and I just want to get this over with, so l ask the police officer to bring in my first victim – his current girlfriend.
She's a total mess. She's shaking like a leaf, l can see the sweat on her forehead from a mile away, her eyes are darting around the room as if she can see something I can't and her shoulders are trembling from her violent sobbing. I already don't like her. "Please take a seat," I say. I point to the chair on the other side of the table and try to look bored. That's my tactic for today. I will ask the most basic questions with the most dull voice and simply focus on people's reactions. Any little gesture or movement can tell you a lot about the person's character and demeanor, as well as their involvement in the case.
Tears are brimming in the corners of her eyes, but she doesn't let them spill. She almost looks like she is somewhere far away, in a kind of daze, and I almost have to wave my hand in front of her face to get her attention. I start with the basics – what’s your name, how old are you, do you have any hobbies … She’s answering like a robot, looking right through me, only giving me single-word answers. "What’s your relation to mister Travis Alexander?” There it is. It's like she got electrocuted, out of nothing she starts bawling her eyes out and blabbering random words. I silently push a box of tissues toward her and wait for her to calm down. "I am…” she flinches, bites back a sob and corrects herself "...was his girlfriend… He was my first real boyfriend, but I wasn't his first... We met on…”
While she’s explaining their cute little love story, which could make me fall asleep on the spot, I keep myself busy by rethinking her words from before, about her not being his first, so when she stops speaking and blows her nose for the thirteenth time,l decide to ask: "If you don’t mind me asking, why did you mention you weren’t his first girlfriend?” She starts to look more annoyed than sad now and with a still trembling voice she says: "Well there was a girl he was dating before me, so of course l got a bit jealous if he mentioned her, not that he was doing that a lot, he was well over her by now, it was more her that hadn’t moved on. Every now and then he would get a message from her about how she missed him and how she was the only one for him… Those texts always came from different numbers, it was really freaky and stalk-ish… But now Travis won't be able to get them anymore because he's DEAD..." And there she goes sniffling and bawling again. I'm done here, I got everything I wanted so I kindly ask her to leave. Her blonde curls are bouncing because she’s shaking so much, but she quickly scurries out, taking the box of tissues with her. I have never met such an emotional person and I can’t help but wonder if, maybe, she could just be faking it all?
When I'm finally done with her, l send her out and take a deep breath. I can already feel a headache forming. The interrogations are my least favorite part about solving crimes. You have to pay attention to every single tiny detail about one’s behaviour, every little twitch and quirk. And it’s exhausting. People are so exhausting.
Unremarkable. Dull. Unnoticeable. These are the words that come to my mind as soon as I lay my eyes on the guy who enters the room. He isn’t tall but he isn’t short either, he isn’t fat but he isn’t toned, he isn’t ugly but he isn’t good looking. Not one thing about him stands out, and that's how the questioning goes as well. His answers aren’t too long, but not too short, not too polite, but not too curt. Still, there are a few things that catch my attention. It’s when I ask about his connection to Travis that his answers get a bit more interesting. "How do you know Mr. Travis Alexander?" A totally normal,very obvions question to ask in a police interrogation. "Well, I'm his best friend, or l guess, was. You see, we met in kindergarten and had been best friends since, even our moms are best friends. I mean, of course we got into a few fights, but, you know, just normal bro things, nothing serious. He even asked me to be his man of honour when he got married.”
Why? Why did he give me this answer? He could have easily stopped after saying they were best friends. Why did he have to go out of his way to explain to me how good of a friendship they had? People usually don’t want to share more than they need to, except if they are really trying to convince someone that what they are talking about is true, since they know a lot of details that others don’t. He regains his cool after that, as if noticing his slip-up, and so his answers become the same as before. Saying just enough, not too much and not too little, with a tone that is neither happy nor sad and an expression that doesn’t give anything away. This guy is so boring I'd forget every single thing he'd told me in the past 15 minutes if it weren't for my notes. "Do you know Jannette?" "Yes, we are very good friends, I've known her since before she and Travis started dating.” He closes his mouth, then opens and closes it again. He looks a bit flustered, but he finally asks: "Was she here before? She couldn't have done that to him, she's too sweet and kind.”
Obviously, anyone with half a brain cell would find this statement pretty odd. Up until this point, I didn’t start the topic of the murder or the killer at all. I guess he realizes his mistake, because things take a turn. His personality does a complete 180. He gets really quiet and starts answering very curtly. What was all that babbling 3 seconds ago about then? And even though I want to keep him there longer and ask him about her more, he uses all of his time up talking about Travis, and now I have another guest scheduled, so I send him out and he leaves without even a "goodbye”. I am feeling drained after just two interrogations, so I decide to try a different approach this time. I put my feet on the table and try to look as nonchalant as possible.
The nerves have kicked in a little bit. I haven’t been the best with doing laundry lately so I can barely find a proper pair of clean jeans and a sweater that I throw over my white shirt. I choose to wear some boots to look at least a little put together for the detective. I straighten my hair and eat a cereal bar on the way to the police station. I am listening to a podcast on self-growth on the way there, trying to calm down the idea I might see the potential murderer at the police station. I don’t know if all the people from his life have been invited to see the inspector together or if we all have different appointments.
I almost skip the turn to our local police station but I end up coming just in time. I like that the waiting room is almost completely empty, but I am also a bit disappointed since the murderer can’t be here. I sit down on a chair you could tell isn’t very clean. The only person in the police station waiting room beside me is an old lady that has come to report her cat missing. I think the cat must be named Shayla because the lady has been repeating the name and praying to find her pet for the last 20 minutes. I sit on a dry yellow chair and as I am waiting for the inspector to invite me in, I peel the dye off the seat. A deep male’s voice calls my name and I open the door that says »authorized personnel only ».
The first thing I see in the room is a massive dark brown office table. On the table I notice the inspector resting his feet. The shoes are office dark brown and they seem huge. I follow the path of the inspector's pants and come to see his button-down shirt tied with a tie. Then I look the inspector in the eyes and respectfully say "hi”. He has a good facial structure, blue eyes and a little mustache. His hair is very precisely combed back and among the black hair I can see some grey strands. I wonder if he ever thought of going to the hair salon to condition his grey hair with the black. Probably not. The gray gives his character depth and experience. He says "hello” back and invites me to take a seat.
As soon as I sit down in his office chair I notice a dusty old red carpet beneath me. As an asthmatic I should take my pills to prevent suffocation in situations like this, but since my mother was a pill-addict I tend to eat as little medication as possible. Now I am left with a problem – if I am not able to breathe, I might look nervous and make the detective suspicious about my innocence. I look up into the yellow light over his desk and try to answer his questions in a way that is as focused as possible, but I can feel my throat squeezing.
The last person I’m interrogating is the so-called "crazy ex”, but I don’t see anything crazy about her when she walks in. If anything, she looks very normal and calm, which feels very welcome after the other two bipolar witnesses. Same as before, I start with polite questions, but this time I try to put tiny traps in them, trying to see how she will react. For example I ask her: "Do you know Travis’s current girlfriend? She’s pretty obsessive, isn’t she?”
But she doesn’t fall for it. She manages to answer everything very methodically, objectively, without letting even a hint of her real emotions show. Still I like her quite a lot. She looks very human, becoming more nervous and tired, answering my pestering questions, and so I agree when she politely asks if she can leave, seeing she’s almost turning green. Although I didn’t get any real insight into her feelings or personality, there’s going to be plenty of time for that later. Besides, I’m getting tired myself, so after she leaves, I decide to go home and think through everything that happened today.
Back Next chapter