Page 87 of The Dysfunctional Family's Guide to Murder
Still nothing. I flick a glance at Dylan, who gives me a tiny, encouraging smile. My body is surging with adrenaline now. I don’t think I could stop if I tried.
“Maybe Martin’s dodgy mate—no offense—also knew about the life insurance and had a plan to get his hands on it. I have no idea.”
“Is there a point to this?” Sasha says, and he’s (finally) stopped smiling, which is a relief, because the whole thing was getting a bit Jokeresque. “You said you wanted to show me something.”
I waggle GG’s phone in my hand.
“This video,” I say, “will show us—and the police—who killed GG.”
Sasha’s face suggests we’re discussing how many calves he expects to sell this year. He really could have been onFarmer Wants a Wife:He’s a good enough actor to feign interest in half a dozen women ostensibly looking for love.
“Whodidkill your grandma?”
“Step-grandma,” I correct him. “And: nobody.” Then I hit play, and it’s such a shame there’s nobody here but me and Dylan and Sasha to see, because it’s about as cool a moment as I’m ever likely to have.
29
GG is smiling into thecamera, and I don’t care how many times I’ve seen this, it’s still creepy as hell. She’s sitting on the edge of her bed, twisted to face the phone, which must be propped up on her bedside table. The cardboard box that so intrigued me is sitting beside her. Also, just in frame, sitting on top of the wardrobe behind her, is the killer typewriter, and once you see it you can’tunseeit, lurking there the way a famous actor in a TV crime procedural never quite blends into the background: You just know they’re going to be outed as the killer in fifty minutes. If you listen hard enough, there’s the grumble of distant thunder in the background.
“This video is for my son, Martin,” GG says. “I’m filming it now because I’m not sure how much time I have left. I don’t think I’m well enough to visit you in prison, Martin, even if you would agree to see me, which I’m not sure I deserve. I’m so sorry that I’ve wasted so many years not being in your life. I was ashamed by what you’d done. But now it all seems so verypetty and ridiculous. I hope one day you’ll forgive me. I hope one day you’ll be able to build a life for yourself.
“Your friend Sasha has been delivering my cards—I couldn’t trust them to the mail, and I’m sorry it’s not more—and he has promised to deliver you this message, along with some other things I want you to have. You’ll probably think I’m ridiculous for having held on to some of these things, but if you ever become a father yourself, perhaps you’ll understand.”
I look at Sasha, who is leaning forward so far, he’s in danger of toppling out of his chair.
“I’d better finish this now; I’m not sure how long this phone can record for,” GG says. “I wanted to leave you something to remember me by, in case we don’t get to meet again.”
GG stands up, with some visible effort, and walks toward the wardrobe. “There’s one more thing I want you to have,” she says, her voice getting quieter as she walks away from the camera. “This typewriter was given to me when I was a girl bymymother. I don’t know if you remember the way you used to love to type on it when you were little. I always told you it’d be yours one day.”
The three of us watch, transfixed, as GG reaches up to grasp the typewriter in both hands. Even knowing what’s going to happen, I’m tense, like this is a choose-your-own-adventure book where a happy ending is still possible. This time GG survives! But, no, instead I have to watch (again) as GG lifts the typewriter down. The angle of the camera makes it impossible to say if she trips over something on the floor or merely staggers under the weight of the machine. (I’ll never suggest as much to Aunty Vinka, but it’s also occurred to me this mightbe the drugs in her tea, rendering her limbs unreliable.) Either way, GG goes backward and the typewriter slips out of her hands, following the most gruesome possible arc to crash against her head. The whole thing is made ten times more gruesome because, just as the typewriter strikes her, there’s a massive clap of thunder. A moment later a flash of lightning illuminates GG as she falls out of frame to the spot where Aunty Vinka will find her the next day.
At this point I pull the phone back from Sasha, who lifts one hand to suggest he’s going to stop me, then puts it back in his lap.
“How…do you have this?” he asks.
That’s maybe not the question I’d be asking, especially given he must know the answer.
“We found it hidden under the floorboards in a box of things GG wanted her son to have. I guess whoever was here that night stashed it in a moment of panic—maybe they thought they heard someone in the house? Maybe they didn’t want to risk being caught with it?—and planned to come back for it when everything had died down.”
“What do you mean someone put it there the night Gertie died?” Sasha says. “This video proves that what happened to Gertie was just an accident.”
“It was,” I say, turning the video back around to face him. “But you might want to see this bit.”
Sasha must know what’s coming—we’ve seen this already, but he’slivedit—but still he cranes toward the screen again like it’s the sun and he’s a neglected houseplant.
We all watch the video on the phone as the door to GG’sbedroom swings inward and stops. There’s a long wait before Sasha’s head appears around the door, staring at something on the floor. I think we can all agree what he’s looking at, and, in my personal opinion, his face doesn’t look nearly horrified enough.
“Can you just—” Sasha reaches for the phone, but I’m ready and pull it back.
On-screen Sasha is already at work: looking under the bed, through the drawers in the wardrobe, rifling through GG’s dressing table. He’s clearly looking for something, but carefully, replacing items as he goes rather than leaving things strewn around behind him. He finds what he’s looking for at the back of the dressing table drawer: a blue velvet box containing GG’s jewelry collection. The box goes into the pocket of his vest as he looks at the writing on the side of the cardboard box and grabs that too. Then he looks up in triumph to notice the phone and his face filling the phone screen. Sasha’s hand looms large, folding over the phone, and everything goes black.
I slip the phone back into my pocket as fast as I can, but Sasha doesn’t even reach for it.
“Did you mean to put GG’s phone in the box or was that a mistake?” I ask. Sasha ignores me, probably because he’s doing an hour’s worth of thinking in about five seconds.
“I want to know about the phones too,” Dylan says, possibly feeling left out. “Did you tamper with the landline and hide Gertie’s phone bill or something, so there was no chance she could call the prison, or was that just a coincidence?”
“I don’t know what you kids think this proves, but that video only shows that Gertie’s death was an accident,” Sashasays.
