Billy
“I don’t know, I don’t know. I was just trying to stop him. It all happened so fast.” Stunned and anguished, the middle-aged policeman passed the back of his hand over his brow as he stared at the motionless body in front of him. He unconsciously returned his handgun to its holster.
“He’s dead,” the younger policeman reported from a kneeling position, his fingers still resting on the adolescent boy’s carotid arteries.
“God.”
“Doesn’t appear to have any weapons,” the younger policeman added. “Just this candy bar in his hand.”
“Yeah…I was trying to hit him low, in the thigh or hip or something, but…”
“Did you get him?” panted the portly theater manager, nearly out of breath as he staggered up to the scene.
“He’s dead,” answered the younger policeman. “I’ll call the desk.”
“Dead, wow…,” replied the manager.
“We’ll get an ambulance here right away,” said the middle-aged policeman. “So, can you tell me again what happened? Why did you call us?”
“Well, like I said before, his behavior was strange, very strange.” The manager frowned and shook his head from side to side.
“What do you mean, strange?”
“Well, for one thing, he spent so much time in the complex. We have six movie theaters, you know, and he would be there by himself every Saturday and Sunday, all afternoon each day. I noticed him at first because he was black and bigger than most of the other kids. He would just walk in by himself, buy a ticket, and then go straight into one of the theaters without saying anything to anyone. After a while, of course, I got suspicious. Was he doing something perverted in there, like bothering girls, or was he doing drugs, or maybe dealing drugs? Something didn’t add up.”
“Did you observe him doing anything out of the ordinary?
“No, not really. I stuck my head in a few times, but every time I did, he just seemed glued to the screen.”
“You said you thought he might be doing drugs. Did you see any evidence of that?”
“Nothing directly. He always acted kind of funny, but I don’t know if it was because of drugs.”
“What do you mean, acted kind of funny?”
“Well, when he started coming in so regularly, I tried being friendly with him. I’d ask him how it was going or say something to him like, that looks like a good movie. But he wouldn’t answer me. He’d look down at the ground, maybe shake his head up and down a little, and that would be it. Then, as soon as someone handed him his ticket, he would beat it straight into the theater.”
“Why did you call us today?”
“Well, a girl came out of one of the theaters and complained about him and some other boys.”
“Why? What did he do?”
“I guess there were several boys his age, high school boys, sitting in front of him and talking during the movie. Apparently, he got very upset about it and told them to shut up. The next thing you know, they’re yelling back at him, and it looks like there could be a fight. That’s when the girl came out. As soon as she told me what was going on, I went in and told them to hold it down or I would call the police. But they kept yelling at each other, louder and louder, so I went back to the lobby and called you. I can’t have that kind of thing going on during a show, I just can’t. Of course by the time you got there, they had all calmed down. But you wanted to talk with the participants, so I thought I’d get him first. I walked up to him and told him in a quiet voice that the police were in the lobby and wanted to see him. He walked out with me, but when he saw you, he bolted. He just bolted.”
“I know. As you say, he was kind of big, and he seemed to have a crazed look in his eyes. When he started running down the street, I ran after him and shouted for him to stop several times, but he didn’t. I thought he had something in his hand and was afraid he was going to hurt some bystander or something. So…”
An ambulance pulled up to the curb, its blue light flashing but no siren. Three emergency technicians got out and worked their way through the small crowd that had gathered around the body.
“Does anyone know who this is?” the younger policeman called out, looking around the group. “He doesn’t have any identification on him.”
“Yeah,” answered a girl standing nearby. “That’s Billy Southwood. He went to the same school I go to.”
“Was he on drugs or something?” asked the middle-aged policeman with a sense of urgency. “It sounds like his behavior was kind of strange.”
“I think he had emotional problems,” answered the girl. “He was in special classes. I don’t know about any drugs.”
“But why did he spend so much time in the theaters?” asked the manager. “Do you have any idea?”
“Maybe in the dark, watching movies with everyone else, was the only time he didn’t feel different.”
