For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn (Short Story)

Also Starring LeVar Burton

Investigating a case like this is definitely the worst part of my job. I really don’t understand how people can do it. I remember the day it happened. I was the one who arrived at the house first; myself and Officer Howell. Mrs Petrelli was hysterical; curled up in a ball by the couch. Crying. Unable to speak. Her eldest son, Martin, trying to calm her down. Scottie, their four year old, watching Spongebob Squarepants on the television, unaware as to what was happening. Helena, their only daughter, was sitting in an armchair drinking tea, trying not to cry. Mr Petrelli directed us into the kitchen, explained to us what had happended. Stephen, the baby, only three months old, had been in his car seat. The car was parked by the side door. Christina (Mrs Petrelli) and Helena were bringing the shopping in from the car. Stephen was only left on his own for a minute. He was in their car, in their garden. Naturally, they thought he’d be safe there for a minute and understandably so, but when they came back out to the car, Stephen was gone. At first they thought Martin had taken him into the house, but Martin was in the back garden with Scottie, he hadn’t even realised they had come home. It was obvious Stephen had been snatched.

We spent four days searching for Stephen and his kidnapper. We remained hopeful, that whoever had taken him would take care of him and that when we arrested whatever bastard had done this, we could return Stephen safely to his family. Unfortunately, things don’t always work out that way. We found the body in a nearby forest. Howell spotted him first and after calling me over ran to vomit in a nearby bush. Howell’s new to the force and no matter what state we had found the body in, he would have been ill, but this would’ve brought even the bravest of cops (even forensics, who see this **** every day) to their knees. I didn’t throw up, but I cried. I cried for the Petrelli family, I cried for the dead boy who never even got his shot at life, and I cried for the son of a bitch that did it, because when I caught up with him, he’d wish he was dead too. Stephen had been chopped into six pieces, the legs, the arms, the head and the torso, and then he had been stuffed in a freezer bag and just left out in the middle of nowhere, to be food for the wildlife. Perhaps it would’ve been better if an animal had gotten to the body first, so that we had nothing to show the family. We didn’t want to show them, but they needed to see. Needed to be sure it was their baby. It was the hardest day I ever had on the job, watching those parents, see their own child, slaughtered and stone cold. I thought Mrs Petrelli was going to die of shock and I remember seeing the rage in Mr Petrelli’s eyes, and I’ll never forget what he said to me and Howell later that day, “Find the bastard that did this to my son and then bring him to me, so I can do to him what he did to my boy!”

As much as I would have liked to do what Petrelli asked, I knew I couldn’t. We arrested Freddie Andopolis a week later. Forensics had confirmed that it was his fingerprints on the body and his semen was also found on the boy. I was nearly sick when I heard that. I could’ve murdered Andopolis myself when I heard that he had raped the baby. What kind of a sick **** would do such a thing, Howell had asked me. He had never met Andopolis before, but me and Andopolis, we had history. I was the one who arrested him when he raped Serena Bennett, but he got off on a technicality. I was ready to track him down and kill the ****er myself at the time, but he struck first. He hadn’t forgotten who had been his arresting officer. He went after my sister, Lindsay, but my partner at the time, Officer Grant managed to save her and Andopolis was put away. As far as I knew he was still rotting away in a prison cell, but apparently he had been released for good behaviour, about two weeks before Stephen went missing. Good behaviour my ass. It wasn’t me who had arrested Andopolis this time, there was too much history between us; they wouldn’t let me. But I was there when he was been questioned. I’ll never forget the sick, twisted grin on his face. His eyes, cold and dead, like any killer. He never answered the questions. Never even spoke. Not a single word between the time he was arrested and the day he was executed.

I was at the execution, as were the Petrelli family, except for Scottie of course, who was far too young for this sort of thing. I knew when Scottie grew up, he’d resent his parents for not bringing him to the execution of his brother’s murderer, but he’d eventually understand why he couldn’t be there. I thought Serena Bennett would have been at the execution too, Lindsay was, as was Howell and Grant and a lot of other people who had been involved in the crimes Andopolis had committed. I found out why Serena Bennett hadn’t been at the execution. Her brother arrived to see the execution. I barely recognised him; it had been so long since Serena’s case. He told me that Serena had committed suicide exactly a year after Andopolis had raped her and he had come to see the bastard fry, just like the rest of us had.

We all watched on as Andopolis was strapped to the chair, hoping that he would suffer as much pain as humanly possible before he died. Everyone in the room with me would have gladly pulled the lever which would send the electricity surging through Andopolis’ body, each of us having our own vendetta against this dirtbag. Before they placed the sack over his head and finally killed the ****er that had caused so many, so much pain. They asked him had he any last words and what he did then will haunt us all in our nightmares for the rest of our lives. Andopolis smiled, laughed maniacally and through the laughter muttered the six words, which were each like a knife to the heart of every person in that room. Andopolis looked at us through the window, looked at each of us, finally focusing on Christina Petrelli and said, “For Sale. Baby Shoes. Never Worn.”

Antilles

I'd always taken "For sale: Baby Shoes, Never Worn" to be about a miscarriage. Funny how we project our own thoughts onto things.