Phantasos by Robert Barnard

door.” Drummond shrugged. “Sounds serious to me.”
    “What about women?” King interrupted. “Was Todd seeing anyone? Romantically?”
    “No,” Danny said.
    “Was he sneaking around? Could he have been having an affair without you knowing?”
    “No,” Danny said. “Why are you asking me so many questions about a woman?”
    King leaned back, sighed, and raised his eyebrows to Drummond. Drummond nodded his head, Go ahead, show him, and King reached down to the floor for his briefcase. He opened it up and took out two clear bags, each marked as evidence, and each one had a single piece of notebook paper inside with some scribbles.
    “First thing’s first,” King said. “We found both of these on Todd’s kitchen table. It looks like he wrote them this morning, before he left the house.”
    Danny reached across the table and picked up the bag on the left. Through the clear plastic bag, he read: Danny. My one true friend. If I don’t come back today, I love you. I’m sorry about all of this. Please take care of yourself, buddy.
    Danny raised his eyes towards the ceiling, fighting back the lump in his throat.
    “And the other,” King said, sliding the evidence bag across the table towards Danny.
    Danny looked down at the note, and read it to himself through the clear plastic: To any law enforcement personnel who may find this—I am writing this in sane body and mind. This afternoon I will drive myself to meet a woman identifying herself as Shelly Flynn at the Sunway Hotel in North Grand Ridge. Should any injury come to me, find this woman. She is responsible.
    “Well?” Drummond said.
    Danny was frozen, reading the note over and over again until the words were practically memorized.
    “Does that name ring any bells?” Drummond asked.
    “It does,” Danny said. “Shelly Flynn was Todd’s fiancé. They used to live together in New York City.”
    Danny took a deep breath, then said: “She died six years ago.”
    Danny adjusted in his chair, and at the request of the officers, started to tell the story of Todd and Shelly…
    The two were living in the lower east side, around ’84. Both were working odd jobs to make ends meet. Todd was primarily focused on electrical wiring, and he had started to make a comfortable wage doing arcade cabinet service and repair. Shelly was an aspiring actress—and at this point in the story, Danny asked the officers if they had ever seen Ghostbusters. They nodded, then he proudly told them of a walk-on role Shelly had towards the end of the film. No speaking lines, but there she was, “the most beautiful girl in the crowd,” as Danny had put it.
    After the Ghostbusters gig, Shelly started to line up more and more serious auditions. Still the occasional soda or fast-food commercial, sure, but more legitimate roles, too.
    It was a morning in early November, Danny recalled, that Shelly was on her way to an audition. She was waiting at her subway stop for the A line, just a few blocks from home. It was early in the morning, so apparently there weren’t many people around. A couple of thugs started badgering her, asking her out, where she was going. Just harassing her. It went from bad to worse when one of them gave up on the romantic advances and focused on her purse. Shelly put up a fight, a struggle ensued…
    One of the thugs grabbed her, fought her for her purse, and when she wouldn’t relent he shoved her and she spilled backwards onto the tracks. Just a moment before the A train was to arrive.
    And that was that. Some Good Samaritan nearby tried to help her up, but it was too late. There was nothing anyone could do. It was over.
    King raised his eyebrows, looked at Drummond. Danny caught the two giving themselves each a look of affirmation.
    “Six years ago, huh?” Drummond said.
    “Yeah. After that, Todd came out to Oregon. To start over, I guess. We met at an arcade expo and opened up Planet X together. Well—mostly him. I didn’t contribute as much as him,