My Winter Break: A Murder Mystery – Part One

Chapter One

Thursday, January 7, 2016. Hatfield, Massachusetts. 6:42 A.M

On his way to work, my father gets pulled over. He is doing 38 in a 25. But the officer doesn’t pull him over right away. No. Instead he waits, pulls out, then follows my father several miles and through a rare Hatfield intersection before coaxing him off the road.

Wednesday, January 13, 2016. Western Massachusetts. 2:27 A.M.

A gang of archetypal Western Mass youths is romping through frozen cornfields in Timberland boots and Patriots jerseys. They set up a row of empty Bud Light cans to shoot with pellet guns. As the one in the camouflage baseball cap misses his fifth can in a row, his girlfriend stumbles into a body. She screams.

In the heart of Western Massachusetts, the body has been found. He had been traveling from Maine down to Connecticut, but now he has been stopped… dead.

Who? Why? How? Only time will tell.

Friday, January 8, 2016. Gill, Massachusetts. 10:00 A.M.

I am sitting at my desk at work, listening to the radio. One local station is hosting a contest: every hour, on the hour, they’ll announce a single word live. If you text that word to the station number, you are entered to win $1,000. I text WINTER, W-I-N-T-E-R, to the number provided, and then wait nervously, my heart pounding. What if they put me on the radio? What would I say? I begin to fear winning more than not.

And then: my phone rings.

Sunday, January 3, 2016. Westwood, Massachusetts. 1:32 P.M.

My father, my sister, and I are visiting my grandparents. We sit around their living room, my sister and I providing life updates (“Brown University… sophomore… all-female comedy blog…”).

Suddenly, my grandmother wakes up from one of her many daytime naps (“Oh, I’m just resting my eyes”). She looks right into my eyes and asks a chilling question.

Wednesday, January 13, 2016. Western Massachusetts. 5:48 A.M.

After being notified by the youths, police find the body and begin their investigation.

Friday, January 22, 2016. South Deerfield, Massachusetts. 10:10 A.M.

I am strapped to a plastic-covered chair, head tilted back. There is blood. A blinding light from overhead makes it impossible to really see what’s going on. I know somewhere beyond this small room, my sister is waiting. Does she know what’s happening to me? Will I ever see her again?

Sunday, January 17, 2016. Greenfield, Massachusetts. 12:02 P.M.

I sit next to my father in a large room. It’s so dark that I can barely see my dad next to me. The room is filled with other people too, but I don’t know any of them.

I don’t realize I’ve gotten a text. My phone has been silenced.

Thursday, January 7, 2016. Hatfield, Massachusetts. 6:45 A.M.

My father sits impatiently in his car. Why can’t the officer just give him his ticket and let him on his way?

The officer finally makes his way back to my father’s open window. “I’m sorry it’s taking so long,” he says, “but you’re coming up in the system as a missing person!”

Friday, January 22, 2016. South Deerfield, Massachusetts. 10:13 A.M.

I’m still in the plastic-covered chair and my mouth aches. She is scraping my teeth with some kind of metal torture device.

“You have very clean teeth,” my dental hygienist says.

I know, I think. I brush twice a day.

She finishes cleaning my teeth, and my dentist comes in to tell me once again that I have the mouth of a small child: my twelve-year-old molars are just coming in, and I have two baby teeth that will never be replaced by big-girl teeth, and will instead eventually just fall out, leaving me with gaping mouth holes.

This statement spurs a series of unfortunate nightmares.

Friday, January 8, 2016. Gill, Massachusetts. 10:10 A.M.

I’m sitting at my desk after having just bravely entered the $1,000 radio contest.

My phone rings.

With shaking hands, I pick up. “Hello?” I say.

It’s my mom. “Did you remember to feed the cats this morning?”

I assure her I did. All five of them. I hang up the phone, exhaling. I’m both disappointed and just a little bit relieved.

But if I didn’t win the radio contest, then who did?

Thursday, January 7, 2016. Hatfield, Massachusetts. 6:46 A.M.

“A missing person,” my dad says, dumbfounded. “What?!”

“Yeah, there’s a missing person with your exact name and birth date,” the officer says.

After some confusion involving calling into police headquarters, the officer finally decides that there’s been some sort of mix up, and lets my dad go on his way.

He doesn’t even give him a ticket.

Sunday, January 3, 2016. Westwood, Massachusetts. 1:33 P.M.

My grandmother whips her 93 year-old head up and asks me the question I’ve been dreading answering since we arrived.

“Do you have a boyfriend?” she asks hopefully.

Once again, I know I will disappoint her.

Sunday, January 17, 2016. Greenfield, Massachusetts. 12:04 P.M.

My father and I wait, anxious, in the darkened room. And then, light.

A massive screen bursts to life in front of us. The movie has begun.

We are here to see The Revenant. My dad read the story of Hugh Glass as a boy at summer camp, and couldn’t wait to see the film, despite my protestations that it would probably be gruesome and sad.

And I was right. Not one character has fun in this movie. Not Hugh Glass, not a single person on his expedition, not even the bear who attacks him.

At the end of the film, Glass wins a battle with his nemesis and then sends him floating down a freezing river. The sound of rushing water is simultaneously peaceful and ominous.

As we exit the theatre, I see the text on my phone: “did u feed cats? –love, mom.”

 

Have you solved it? Who is the body? Who is the killer? Will I ever be able to tell my grandmother that I have a boyfriend?

Send us your guesses and if you’re correct, you’ll be entered to win $1,000 in a radio contest.

 

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