The Birthday Present

The Birthday Present

Gordon stood in the doorway, preparing himself for the violent crime scene he was about to detect. No, not detect. Witness? Explore? Oh, yes. Investigate. He was an investigator, after all.

Gordon grinned smugly to himself before remembering grinning at crime scenes was not very professional.

He had gotten the call just twenty minutes before, as he was driving through a tunnel on his way to dinner.

It was Ramsey’s wife.

The line was breaking in and out under the tunnel, but Gordon managed to pick up the general idea:

“Ramsey… shot… dead… come quick” was all he could decipher through the fizzling connection.

Of course, being an incredibly professional private detective, he grimaced and somberly said, “I’ll be right there Mrs. Ramsey. I’m already on my way.”

Gordon couldn’t say he was surprised.

The facts of the case were this: Yesterday was Ramsey’s fortieth birthday party. The party had been an exclusive dinner, which Gordon himself had attended.

Many suspicious characters. Many possible suspects.

In fact, he had mused as he made a short stop at a Starbucks beforehand, maybe everyone had been in on it. Yessss, it was quite possibly a Murder-On-The-Orient-Express situation. Yes… that could very well be it. After all, everyone at Ramsey’s party had had reason to kill him.

Ramsey was, plainly put, a very killable person. Gordon suspected the only reason Ramsey had got away with not being murdered until now was his looks.

Extremely handsome. Well-proportioned. Gorgeous. Stunning. Striking. Hunky, even. Gordon sighed and took a sip of his white chocolate mocha. Pity he was dead.

But Ramsey’s voluptuous elephant-sized thighs and rippling shoulders were not the point. The point was that Ramsey was dead, and anyone at the party could be responsible.

Take his wife, for example. Horrible woman. Vaped indoors, didn’t even dress her salad before she ate it, as if twenty extra calories would induce a diabetic heart attack. Perhaps Mrs. Ramsey killed her husband in a fit of jealousy? For there was no way she was unaware of Ramsey’s infidelity–Ramsey was not one for monogamy, and Gordon could personally attest to this evidence. Yes, this was a very likely motive.

Then again, Mrs. Ramsey said he had been shot, and Gordon seriously doubted Mrs. Ramsey possessed firearms. She was extremely liberal, one of those modern women.

So then, Ramsey’s brother perhaps? Gordon had seen for himself the way that Ramsey’s brother’s car was plastered with bumper stickers that said things like, RIGHT IS RIGHT–VOTE RIGHT, THIS DRIVER IS ARMED AND PROUD, and AmeriCAN : MexiCAN’T. Last night at the dinner party, Gordon was sure he had brought up his new nine millimeter at least four times in conversation.

Gordon sighed. He readjusted his tie and smoothed his hair. His chronic constipation today was worse than usual, for whatever reason. He would have to call the doctor after this and request a stronger laxative.

Gordon thought back to the words that had crackled through his receiver just twenty minutes before…

Ramsey

Death

Shot

Come quick

He rang the doorbell. When no one came to the door, he rang it three more times. Then twice more for good measure.

On the seventh ring, the door swung open and promptly hit Gordon in the face.

There, on the porch, stood none other than Mrs. Ramsey. Mrs. Ramsey, in all her over-lined lipstick, Dolly-Parton wannabe, crystal-loving, (husband killing?) glory.

“Hello darling,” he beamed, to which she promptly grabbed his forearm and dragged him violently into the house.

The first thing that struck him about the crime scene was the smell. So this is what a freshly dead body smells like, he thought, slightly disappointed. It smelled no different than a pile of particularly nasty feces.

“The body–” Mrs. Ramsey croaked.

“Oh yes. How rude of me to not greet you, Mrs. Ramsey. How are you dear?”

At this, she looked at him through bloodshot eyes as if he had just killed a puppy. He found this extremely rude considering how polite he was being.

“Here,” Gordon said, holding out the remaining half of his mocha as an offering of empathy, “my condolences on your husband's death.”

She shook her head and ignored the outstretched starbucks cup, bringing a palm to her forehead.

“I don’t know how it happened. One moment, he was clearing the table from the party, and the next… he was on the floor,” she whispered.

“Can you tell me, if you don’t mind, was there anyone at the house when this occurred?” Gordon inquired, flipping open his special detective notebook that he kept in his special detective trench coat.

“Well, me, Marcia, his brother, and my brother.”

Hmmm. Intriguing.

All four had obvious motives. Mrs. Ramsey, of course, the betrayed wife. His brother–hungry for Ramsey’s inheritance and his large Pokemon collection. And Gordon knew for a fact that Ramsey had had affairs with both Mrs. Ramsey’s brother and Marcia, Mrs. Ramsey’s best friend.

It was all beginning to come together. He could picture it in his mind; the four of them agreeing that Ramsey must be killed, and the morning after his birthday dinner, putting their plot into action. Avenging his various infidelities, they had taken one of Ramsey’s brother’s guns and done the deed. Yes. This was more than possible.

Sniffing, Gordon flipped shut the notebook and put it back in his pocket. He smoothed his mustache. (Not so much a mustache as a collection of six or seven wayward hairs, but alas).

“Can you please lead me to the body, Mrs. Ramsey?”

They walked up the stairs and to the closed door of the bedroom.

“I feel like I should warn you. It’s a bit–” she began, voice wavering, but Gordon cut her off.

“My dear, I have been to countless crime scenes, do not worry about me. I am a professional.”

Drawing her lips into a thin line, she slid the door open.

And there was Ramsey.

Laying on the floor.

But he was not covered in blood… he was covered in…

…Shit?

Ramsey’s corpse was buried in it, like a basted turkey.

Gordon took a step back, the stench bringing tears to his eyes.

“I thought… you said… he got shot,” he wheezed.

“Shot? I never said such a thing. I said, ‘he shat to death’. Didn’t you hear me?”

Not shot, but shat?

Gordon gasped, throwing himself against the door. Last night flashed through his mind like a bullet train.

Gordon had been extra constipated last night. (He had a severe case of IBS, after all). The doctor had been prescribing him powerful laxatives.

That night, he had double dosed, hoping to be able to take a nice smooth dookie for the first time in weeks. He had discreetly dissolved the two pills into his champagne glass.

But then–had he not been sitting next to Ramsey for the duration of the party? He remembered this clearly, because they had been playing footsies the whole night. And the glasses… his and Ramsey’s next to each other on the table, looking exactly identical…

“Oh my god,” he murmured.

He looked at his own two hands, quivering. Hands covered not in blood, but in feces.

“It was me,” he muttered, and fell to his knees beside the body.

Ramsey’s wife began crying, but Gordon could hear nothing, could see nothing, could only smell the stench of his own guilt.

“It should’ve been me,” he gasped, rocking back and forth on the pile of feces, “it should have been my shit.”