Thinking of Her

Finding a dead body on the edge of the park first thing in the morning wasn't my idea of how to start a day. Actually, it wasn't how I started my day. First, I had rolled out of bed, then I had a glass of orange juice, and followed that with donning my jogging suit, the thickest pair of socks I owned, my beat-up old tennies and my boy hat — as my ex-girlfriend liked to call my knit cap decorated with tassels and cute little flowers.

I had opened the door of my cottage prepared to brace myself against one of the coldest winter storms Burnsville had ever experienced — because like it or not, I had to jog or I didn't function through the day — and had been shocked by the incredibly still air...until I closed the door and stepped out, then wind gusted up and almost knocked me flat.

But finding a dead body, half in the park, half out...seeing her hair splayed across the pebbles, the snow piling up on her body, the back of her parka puffed up and floating like a buoy, the murder weapon — a blood-drenched rock, only inches away — made the orange juice rise to my throat and turn sour.

Help! Who in their right mind other than myself was out for a jog at six a.m.? It was, after all, still so dark that the seagulls hadn't shown up for their breakfast of minnows. Thank Allah. I'm not sure if I could've handled seeing a dozen birds scouring her body for food. Oh, Farxiyo. I wanted to touch her, to hold her, to bring her back to life. I'd only known her two weeks. She had been the sweetest Somali singer I'd ever encountered, and I'd encountered a few over the past five years of living in Burnsville, few of them sweet.

I looked back at Farxiyo's swollen body and my stomach lurched. If I only had a blanket. To keep her warm. To do something. Help, someone! Farxiyo had recently arrived in Burnsville to find herself...it's like a recurring nightmare for many of us up here. She had left her boyfriend of three years somewhere back in the Bloomington, near Mall of America, the famed mall, that you, the reader, probably knew or heard it.

On an impulse, I leaned down next to her to say a quick prayer. That's when I saw a partial track left in the almost-frozen mud by her head, the welts of hiking boots filling with silt and lapping water. Evidence, I mumbled, wishing to Allah I had a camera so I could record it before the near-freezing waters of lake eroded it into nothing.

Whoever had done this hideous act had covered all his tracks except one. Did he know? Would he be back? Help, Damnit! I wasn't willing to run up to the road and leave her. She needed me with her. I'd want someone with me if I — I covered my mouth in an effort to lock in the throw-up, and remembered how when Farxiyo had gotten off early one day, we had taken a run down a black diamond slope together — kindred spirits, she had called us.

I got all the low-down on her boyfriend on our first meeting, not that it was that much information. In fact, I can be rather chatty on the ski slopes, and I think Farxiyo may have gotten my entire life history in that brief period instead of the vice versa. Obviously, I don't have a huge life history if it only takes fifteen minutes, but hey. Anyway, I don't think I learned much more about her except she and he had talked about marriage, but then had decided against it.

I recalled how Farxiyo had clammed up then. Said something like her mother wouldn't have approved. We had made promises that we would ski together on her next day off, but neither of us had followed up on the plan. So much for kindred spirits. And now she laid before me...dead. Her brains bashed in. Her once-lovely face purple. Her eyes wide open, staring at the sky in obvious shock that someone would take her life. And I felt the tug of kindred spirits, like I was destined to help her and wouldn't go to heaven myself if I didn't.

Guilt can be quite a motivator. Please, someone, can you hear me? I screamed at the top of my lungs, hoping to heaven someone would answer. I didn't want to let her lie here, and I didn't dare move her. I've watched episodes of murders in soap operas — there had to be at least one a season for ratings — enough to know that you can't move a murder victim and screw up the crime scene. There were always technical advisors on the set that filled us in on these little details.

Who did this to you, Farxiyooy? I whispered, as if speaking to her spirit on some other plane. Pretty little farixiyo, who always said, Have a good day, every time I got on the chair lift, who smiled every time a child skied up. It didn't matter if it was one of those kids with attitude on snowboards in baggy pants or a tiny tot with chapped lips, sunburned red face and snot hanging out its nose, she smiled.

She was the essence of purity and innocence. Dead. Somebody, help! I was getting angry. Why in the hell wasn't anyone up and around to help? Where were the police? What's going on? I heard a woman shout from the railing above. Dead body, I yelled, as if every day there was a dead body. I couldn't believe how calm my voice sounded. The flare of a flashlight blazed a path down the freshly fallen snow, then I heard the woman dashing down the hill, crunching the frozen ice beneath her feet, only to realize it was Safiyo Haji, the hottest looking cop in ski pants, the only friend I had in town other than Farxiyo.

Safiyo raised her beam to my face, then said in a hoarse whisper, Jaakoole, you look like crap. I don't look as bad as Farxiyo. You know her? Safiyo asked, turning the light on the girl's body. She shuddered sound, then gasped, a sound like all the air being let out of a tire. Farxiyo Ali. I couldn't feel my fingers in my gloves so I clapped my hands together. Moved here two weeks ago.

Safiyo bent closer, examined the hair without touching it, then shut Farxiyos eyes. Poor kid. She's been murdered, Safyooy. I can see that. Safiyo haji's impatience was renown. Not once but three times I had seen Safiyo bust a door down with the heel of her boot — she always wore hiking boots in the winter, black ones, with thick soles and heavy laces, unless she was skiing, and then they were streamlined white Nordicas, top of the line.

She brushed a strand of her thick black hair off her face, reached into her stylish black parka, pulled out a walkie-talkie and switched it on. Well, what do we do now? I asked. We...do nothing. I call it in. Just out for your run? I nodded. Me, too. Good thing I came this way. I nodded again, feeling like one of those Chinese dolls you find at the tourist stores, where the head bounces up and down on a coil but never seems to find its bearings.

She'd just broken up with her boyfriend, I offered. Safiyo was busy licking her finger and wiping off a ketchup stain from her classy black jacket. She looked up, grinned. I was a slob at breakfast. Then she covered the mouthpiece of the walkie-talkie and said, Got a name? Farxiyo — I meant for the boyfriend? Dumbly, I shook my head. Farxiyo and I hadn't gotten around to fine-tuned personal items.

After another three minutes, I heard the wail of sirens, followed by the skidding of a team of boots down the icy stairway. Keep a distance, Waryaa, Safiyo barked. The arrival of reinforcements seemed neatly timed with sun-up, but it wasn't until I was asked to move to the side that I started to really take in the view.

The storm had moved on, and the crystal clear morning rose, enhanced by a perfect orb of blazing orange peeking over the Nevada side of the lake's celebrated mountain ring. Gloriously the sun was focusing its shimmering path of gold across the lake — a deep blue like you've never seen anywhere else in the world — straight to Farxiyo's body, as if it was a pathway back to Janatul Fardowza. I hoped that was where she was going to go.

As I said, I didn't know her all that well. Nobody had asked me to leave, so I brushed the early morning snow off a huge boulder and sat my cold ass down, surprised at the groan I made, more surprised at the creak from my knees — turning 33 was hard— and I watched as Safiyo Haji directed her subordinates to take notes, snap photographs, put up a yellow tape barring onlookers. Each movement seemed choreographed, even though the underlings were unaccustomed to homicide in the serene town of Burnsville City — where the norm included picking up hitchhikers and talk of another fine ski day to be expected at all the local bars.

Serenity at its best. Of course, that wouldn't be the norm during summer, but it was the middle of February, President's Day weekend, the height of the ski season, and my mind can only cope with one season at a time. Safiyo crouched down to peer at Farxiyo's face, I cried out, Safiyo, stop! A print. There's a print in the water! What an idiot to forget so soon! Safiyo looked up, startled, her face a mixture of pain and loathing.

What in the hell? Then it dawned on me. I'd never seen Safiyo on a morning run, and as I said, I ran daily. I suddenly remembered making fun of her the day we met saying that she probably fought like the butterfly Mohammed Ali had referred to in his poem. Fierce, but with grace. But she claimed she never exercised. I stared at Safiyo, knowing the lines of worry must be cropping up all over my sunburned face.

How had I missed the obvious? The slightly turned up nose, the hard arch of the brow, a devilish glint in Safiyo's eye that looked mischievous in Farxiyo's. Safiyo Haji Abdalla. Farxiyo's mother, the mother who wouldn't approve of Farxiyo's boyfriend. I blinked, trying to take the whole picture in. The smudge on her jacket — not catsup, but it sticky and red...like blood. The footprint — the deep welts filling with icy lake water, an exact match to Safiyo's more than likely.

When I could see the tips of her boots a few inches from mine, I looked up. Her breath stunk of bile. Her cheeks were flushed crimson. What happened? was all I could croak. I don't know. It was like a blind — Safiyo gulped in the cold air. I envisioned the raging storm earlier, the way the wet wind cut sideways through the streets, Safiyo tossed and turned by frantic emotions. I loved her, Jaakoole. More than my own life. The creases around Safiyo's eyes made her look every day of her forty-eight years.

She'd grabbed the rock. She swore she'd kill me. I tore it away from her. Her hands clenched like claws. Then something evil crawled inside me, every memory of my nightmare with her father, the way he beat me, the way she watched with tears in her eyes while clutching her blankie. Safiyo sighed deeply. He beat her — Her father? No, the boyfriend. Safiyo sounded both exhausted and irritated. But she wouldn't leave.

I screamed and screamed at her to wake up — see what would happen. Then there was a blackness, and all I remember is seeing her lying in the water, her sweet head bleeding. Safiyo bent over her shoes and retched. I was going to get a blanket. I had to leave her to get a blanket. Safiyo Haji started slapping her chest with her right palm, harder, faster. What have I done? I took Safiyo's hands in mine, then drew her into my arms and rocked her, knowing I could never remove the pain nor the guilt.

When the racking sobs subsided, she pushed away from me, wiped the tears from her face then smiled sadly, pulled her gun from her holster and blew a hole in the side of her head. It was all so fast. So unbelievable. A seagull screeched above. I looked up, but the image was blurred by the moisture flooding my eyes. **** It's weeks later, and I am still in the business of writing, but about what I can't understand.

Hey waryaada it just a fiction (ladhoobdhoobey. Dont take it serious heedhe because if I ever see a dead body in real life, I would have been thrown into jail. I got the eyes of a killer, according o my friends, and that is a good witness, soo ma'ahan yaah. Maybe it is time to get a makeup to change my pretty-like dadqalato eyes to something else.