A Sleepy Carter Mystery 2: A Murder in the Quarters by Brian W. Smith

Author:Brian W. Smith [Smith, Brian W.]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: United States, Mystery, African American, Thriller & Suspense, Literature & Fiction, Mystery; Thriller & Suspense
Amazon: B0147F2FAG
Publisher: Brian W. Smith
Published: 2015-08-19T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 6

Sleepy stared out the window on the west side of his abode. It was six-twenty eight, and the sun had turned that familiar red-orange color to signal it was calling it quits for the day.

If I’m going to do this, I need to start getting ready right now, he thought.

Nestled in the corner of his living quarters was a huge storage chest. Sleepy flicked the latches simultaneously with his thumbs and lifted the lid slowly, like it contained treasures and fragile relics from a different era—because it did.

The tattered stinky overcoat he wore the night he staggered onto Lizzy’s block was neatly folded on top. Underneath the coat, folded in a perfect square, were the dingy dungarees he wore. Sleepy pulled them out and allowed the legs to unfurl. The grass stains from the fall he took when Lizzy burst through her backdoor and sent him tumbling off her back porch were still visible on the knees. Sleepy removed the sweater he wore that night and pressed it against his face. It smelled like the Summer Breeze scented fabric softener Lizzy used to clean it. Last but not least, he pulled out his crown from the chest—a black knit cap.

I didn’t think I’d ever wear this stuff again.

He spread the items on the bed and stared at them. The sight of his old clothes sent his mind whirling back to a time when depression weighed him down like an anchor. When massive oak trees in various Uptown parks were used to keep his body propped up while he slept off another night of drowning his sorrows in a bottle of Wild Turkey. He thought about his fall from investigative grace and becoming a proficient collector of discarded aluminum cans and turning them in to recycling plants for pennies.

The bothersome images of his life as a vagrant dissipated. His facial expression morphed from pensive to a softer form when the thing he considered to be the biggest benefit of being homeless flashed across his mind—invisibility.

The ability to move among the masses—even in broad daylight—without being seen was priceless to him. Sure, folks noticed the bearded unkempt homeless man strolling at a snail’s pace along the Garden District streets, but no one really saw him. For all intents and purposes he was just another obscure piece in the city’s eclectic landscape—and he loved it.

Sleepy’s cleansed body was free of the caked on dirt that made his skin appear darker in those often overlooked areas. His scalp no longer itched. His hair, which was once as thick and coarse as wire mesh, was now shorter, tapered, and more receptive to the advances of a comb. He still had a beard, but allowing it to touch his chest was a thing of the past. The smell of scented body wash replaced the gag inducing stench that used to seep from his pores. By any normal standard of measure, Sleepy’s quality of life was undeniably better than it had been two months earlier. But comfort and contentment sometimes find it hard to co-exist.

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