At first, there are very few details about what happened.

That’s OK. Better, probably.

Obviously, work is cancelled for the next few days while you handle lawyers and relatives. You take a crash course in the workings of the criminal digestive tract as Aggressor inches through it.

You make a game plan for how you are going to handle police questions, should they call.  Aggressor hasn’t made contact with anyone on the outside, but the lawyer says that’s good. All outgoing calls are recorded. Anything at this point could only hurt strategy.

Then there are the incidental phone calls from strangers: Someone was supposed to pay Aggressor money, and usually that was a check sent to their home, but given the circumstances… what do they do? Is this like a free payday?

I mean, why the fuck not? Somebody should get something good out of this.

But breaking the rules seems dangerous. You say you’ll make some calls, figure out what to do.

#

In the downtime, you start a slow, vulturing circle through the available news articles. There are more and more each day.
You read everything.
You read the comments.
It is weirdly comforting to go on reddit and see the top comment is a joke. Good old social media. Never change, man.

You search twitter, and facebook, and some disreputable news sources. Anywhere you might spy people discussing what happened. Maybe you are attempting to further understand, to use the masses to sharpen your theories and angles and reactions.

But pretty quickly, you realize most comments are thinly veiled attempts to push personal agendas, or at least whittle a Real Life Event into A Story, complete with a moral and neat character arc.

But it’s still nice. Rude or funny or completely speculative, here are your people: those who are interested in discussing the topic of What The Actual Fuck Happened?

You circle back to the more legit news, land on one of the picked over, day old articles. You expect it to be the same. Why are you even here? I dunno. It’s something to do.

The article now features a short video of a house you’ve been inside, and Victim’s name, as well as witness interviews; what they heard, what they saw.

The fourth time you watch the video, it dawns on you:

Any smart criminal might make a reasonable living simply by typing in Victim’s name, matching it to the address that came up in their white pages listing, and cautiously slipping over there a few evenings from now to loot whatever they wish. There will definitely not be anyone home there for a while.

You talk with your spouse about how maybe it’s a good idea to go to the house. Do police lock up a place after they’re done? Better check. You should definitely clean out the fridge. Maybe take valuables out and put them in a storage unit. Turn off the water. That house may stand empty a long time.

Then you realize what this might look like.

Looting. Touching things that belong to the dead. Moving them in a way that may steal very dark and personal magic from someone who might wish to make a pilgrimage, to capture what Victim’s last day was like.

You decide maybe it’s better to risk items being stolen than be the one who took them.

#

You need to start notifying people about what happened.

But guess what? There isn’t a great social model for how to do this. I mean, you open your mouth and

because… how?

There are more selfish reasons. You have this moment, this sacred space, to work out how you feel without anyone else’s fingerprints in your thoughts.

Once you sucker-punch other people with this news, they will barf on you whatever weird reaction they have. They will try and shape the way you feel with platitudes or God’s Wills or whatever they think would make them feel better, were the situations reversed.

That’s fine. But right now, the only voice you want to hear is your own. You are doing the bloody work of inserting that jagged thought into your head. You don’t want anyone to jostle you at this moment.

#

Aggressor’s employer gives an extremely curt quote to a newspaper, disavowing Aggressor in all ways. The quote is the HR workplace encapsulation of

via GIPHY

Which seems just. But also like a cheap shot.

Or maybe you are just jealous as you yourself cannot disavow family so easily.

Your spouse visits Aggressor’s workplace website, and all traces of Aggressor are now completely washed from existence. As far as the workplace is concerned, Aggressor never happened.

All those ducats and honors Aggressor amassed over time? They mean little to anyone now. If anything, they are liar’s trinkets, evidence of a monster pretending to be human, prizes we doled out to Aggressor for successfully fooling us all. Or maybe they are evidence that Aggressor was a good person most of the time, they just did this one super-duper-horrible thing.

You know the answer is somewhere in between, and also that you’ll probably never know what the actual answer is. And also that this will be bothersome for a long time, if not forever.

#

The workplace quote surfacing in social media underlines how word is spreading. If you do not call and notify people, they may find out some other way.

You consider the possibilities for quite a while, but you can’t seem to settle on an opening line.

So you don’t call.

Of course as time passes, it’s only going to be worse. People like to know right away. They like to be in the inner circle. Nobody wants to hear explosive news six months after it happens. I mean, you could really offend people who loved you and thought they knew you.

Guess what, you don’t really know anyone! You might cackle, were they to be butt-hurt about it. But then you might sound like some kind of crazed, homicidal maniac. You can’t really afford to make jokes like that right now.

#

You think, when you get up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, that Victim is near.

You don’t see a ghost or get a whiff of them or anything. Just this strange notion they are somehow there. Or maybe waiting to be there. The same way someone on your porch is at your house but not exactly in your house. You’ve been watching The Haunting of Hill House, and probably that was a mistake.

Victim would have no reason to visit you anyway. I mean, COME ON. If there’s one person Victim would be pissed at right now, it isn’t you. Still, you firmly think inside your head, YOU ARE NOT WELCOME HERE. Because no offense, but there is enough going on without this additional bullshit.

#

It’s almost time to get back to work. You start handling normal business. You run errands, you make appointments. People casually ask, “How’ve you been?”

and you say “Fine.” Exactly as bored and calmly pleasant as you’ve said it all your adult life.

Inside, you are scream-cackling because apparently it’s true: You don’t really know anyone after all because nothing is fine.

But on the outside, the conversation has already moved on in a normal fashion.

And so maybe in some way you are fine? It’s very confusing.

#

But it’s not all bad. There are moments of pure, gold sunshine. When you sit for dinner that you made for yourself, for people you love, you are shockingly aware that you are alive.

You are not eating dinner in a prison cell. You did not FUBAR your whole life. You are not cold and empty in the morgue, never to eat anything again.

And the food is the best food that ever was,

and the company is exquisite,

and you are free to eat and live and go about as you please.