The ringing of the phone, yes an old school setting of a telephone ring on his phone, awakened Ethan from a sound sleep at 3:04 a.m. At 25 you would think he might have still been out with friends at that time, especially on a Friday night. But he had fallen asleep on the couch about midnight after a very long and stressful week. Each day this week the pressure had built more and more and he knew he was the only one who could do what had to be done. At least he felt that way.
The phone just kept ringing as he moved towards the coffee table where it lay while thinking of what the call could mean. Since finding out on Monday that his Congressman had died he had felt an ache in the bottom of his stomach. Just last weekend he had seen the man getting into a stretch limo outside of a jazz club that he himself was going into. He thought it was odd to see him because he had always heard that the Congressman fancied opera. Still, Ethan thought it was kind of cool that the Congressman would appreciate jazz as well. Good for you man he thought to himself as he turned from seeing the limo drive away to going into the club to the sounds of sax and trumpet and more soothing his aching heart. Jazz will do that, except when it penetrates a hurt in a different way that doesn’t soothe at all but brings out the pain.
He hadn’t thought about that anymore until hearing of the Congressman’s death. The report said that he had been sick in bed for a week and had finally succumbed to the illness. Most people just heard the news, said that was too bad, and turned to the next news item or favorite video to watch again. Ethan couldn’t get it out of his head. He knew the Congressman hadn’t been in bed for a week. He knew he had seen him last Friday night, just a week ago now, and he was climbing into a limo.
Ethan also knew that it was none of his business. Who cares whether the man was bedridden for a week or had gotten out for one night for some jazz? If he was dying who could blame him. But something just didn’t feel right about it. Why would anyone hide the fact that during his illness he decided to go out on a night that he felt a little better and enjoy some good music? Wouldn’t that make him more human, more of a regular guy? Surely no one would berate a dying man for wanting to be out among the living just one more time.
Ethan had shaken it off on Monday when he heard about it and gotten back to work. Then after work late that afternoon he drove by the jazz club on his way home and saw that it had a sign on it that it was closed. Closed for good. That definitely seemed strange since it had been around for a lot of years and when he was there it looked full and very prosperous.
He pulled in front of it and saw a guy coming out and locking the door. He rolled down his window and said that it was too bad the place was closing, that he really liked coming there. The guy just looked around like he was afraid that someone was watching and said he agreed that it was too bad. Ethan said that he had been there on Friday night and thought he had seen the Congressman getting into a limo outside. The guy stared at him and said he didn’t know anything about that and Ethan must have been mistaken. Then he hurried away as Ethan stared after him.
That night Ethan did some research on the Congressman online. It seems that, as he had always heard, the Congressman was one of the good guys. He tried to do what would help the people he represented while still caring about the country overall. He would be missed for sure. Ethan closed the cover of his laptop and went to bed, still wondering about having seen the guy getting in that limo.
The next day he saw a news report about how there would not be a viewing for the Congressman and not even a funeral or a burial. He was being cremated and his family would privately scatter his ashes somewhere. There was to be nothing public at all. He thought that was pretty strange for such a public figure but the report said that his family was asking everyone to respect their wishes for privacy in this loss. He could respect a family’s wishes for privacy but this seemed very odd to him that there wouldn’t be at least some kind of time and place for people to express their feelings about the Congressman.
It was Wednesday as he was eating lunch at a Food Truck several blocks from his work that he glanced over his chilidog and saw the man from the jazz club talking to a man in a suit and nodding over at where he was. That guy wasn’t nodding at Ethan he was nodding towards him so that the man in the suit would see him. Ethan glanced away and took a bite of his lunch and then started walking back to work, still eating and carrying his drink.
When he finished lunch he stopped to throw the trash in a garbage can along the street and noticed that the jazz club man and the suit guy were walking at a little distance behind him in the same direction as he was going. They looked away when they saw that Ethan had seen them. This whole thing was getting stranger.
Ethan walked into his office building and tried to shake it off as a coincidence as he worked that afternoon. That night he stopped at his church to just sit and pray awhile in a quiet atmosphere. It felt good to just be there and sort through his thoughts, hoping that God would give him peace to just let this all go.
But that didn’t happen. Instead, he sensed that he should not just let it go but instead try to figure this out, or at least let someone know what he had seen. He could pass on his information to the police and then just let it all go and get back to his life.
On his way home he stopped at the Police Station and asked to speak with an officer. The officer heard what he told him about having seen the Congressman the previous Friday night outside the jazz club. He listened to Ethan and said he would pass it on to his Captain but that there was no ongoing investigation about the Congressman’s death so there was really no one to talk to about this. He thanked him for being a concerned citizen and assured him that what he had told him would be passed along.
Ethan left the Police Station feeling like he had done what he was supposed to do and that now it was time to just let it all go. Evidently, someone else agreed with him because when he got back to his apartment there was a note that had been slipped under his door. It said that if he was smart he would just let it all go. The note didn’t say what “it” was but there was no doubt in his mind what they were talking about.
Ethan took a picture of the note, put it back into the envelope that it had been in, and went back to the police station to find the officer that he had just talked with and handed him the note. The officer read it and then disappeared for a few minutes before coming back to Ethan and asking him to come with him to the Captain’s office. Ethan followed him and then told the Captain everything that he had told the officer earlier and gave him the note that he had just found at his apartment.
The Captain looked very serious and told him not to talk to anyone else and that he would follow up on all of this. He told Ethan what a good thing he had done by reporting this. Very few would have he said. Very few get involved. He was grateful and even though he thought that it was probably nothing serious he would look again at the report that the officer had filed earlier and make sure it was updated and looked at again.
The next day when Ethan got to work his boss called him into his office. He told Ethan that a police officer had called him and asked about the kind of person that Ethan was, about his character and his trustworthiness. He didn’t tell his boss what this was about but his boss knew it must be serious. He asked Ethan what this was all about and Ethan told him that it was best if he didn’t tell him, that he had been asked by the police not to tell anyone.
Just then the phone of his boss rang and he answered it. He glanced at Ethan and nodded that he should leave his office and close his door on the way out. After Ethan was out he could hear his boss talking quietly to someone and heard his own name in the conversation.
Though he hadn’t been at work long, Ethan decided to leave and get a cup of coffee to try and calm down. He knew something was up and now his boss knew something about it, whatever it was. He walked to a food truck that was selling coffee and danish a block away and got what he wanted and started walking. By the time his head cleared he realized that he had been out walking for an hour or so and decided he better get back to work.
Upon arriving at the building and walking inside he was greeted by a security guard that he had never seen before. Normally Ethan would greet the regular guard and then talk a moment about a game the night before or about the weather. Today, however, Ethan was asked for his company ID. Quizzically, Ethan pulled it out and handed it to the new security guard who told him that it would not be returned and that Ethan had been terminated by the company and should leave immediately.
Stunned but being walked back out the door by the guard Ethan realized that something was very wrong. Just an hour or so ago he was talking with his boss and now he was fired, without his boss even having the decency to tell him about it himself.
The guard stepped back inside the building and Ethan stood there for several minutes just looking at him and the building and not believing what was going on. Then he turned and went to the police station to talk to the officer that he had talked with just the day before. But the officer wasn’t there. Ethan was told that the officer had not reported for work this morning. The person at the desk laughed and said maybe he had decided to take a vacation that he had been talking about for a long time.
Ethan asked if he could talk with the Captain and after waiting for an hour was finally shown in to see him. When he walked into the Captain’s office a man greeted him and asked how he could help him. It wasn’t the man that he had talked with just the day before. Ethan asked about him and was told that the other man had been reassigned to another precinct.
Ethan thought that it was interesting that the policeman had not shown up today and the Captain was reassigned but he tried not to let on and just asked this Captain if he knew about his report from the day before. Ethan told him his name and the Captain said he didn’t know anything about it but he had just gotten there this morning from the other precinct and Ethan should tell him the details. Ethan told him what he had told the policeman and now the Captain asked Ethan to wait outside of his office while he checked on it.
While Ethan waited he saw several people go in and out of the Captain’s office. Then he was called back in and told that there was no record of him or any report on him. Ethan asked if he could have the note back that he had brought in the night before but the Captain said there was no record of any note either so he couldn’t help him out with that.
Just as Ethan was pulling out his phone to show the Captain a picture of the note that he had received he thought better of it and just said that he had gotten a text from his Dad and needed to check on him. The Captain told him not to worry about his report and that the Congressman had been at home for a week before he died and that Ethan must have been mistaken that he had seen him out. Ethan just smiled and said that he certainly could have been wrong and thanks for talking to him.
As Ethan left the police station he felt like he was being watched. But every time he looked around there was no one. So he went home and got on the internet and looked for more information on the Congressman and his death. Not much was there about his death other than the fact that the Governor had already appointed someone to fill his congressional seat until the end of the term. The Governor had decided that since it was only eleven months until the end of the Congressman’s term that they wouldn’t have time for a special election before then. Ethan didn’t recognize the name of the person who the Governor had appointed. He had never heard of him. But he knew that the Governor was of a different party than the Congressman had been and so had most likely appointed someone of his own party. That’s how those things worked.
The minority party had only been three persons away from reclaiming the majority in the House of Representatives. Now the margin was only two. Ethan thought to himself that it was too bad that his Congressman had died. He was a really good guy.
It wasn’t until the next day, after spending the day searching for a new job, that he had time to look up more about the new Congressman. He recognized him when he saw him in a news interview that night. He was the man in the suit that he had seen with the jazz club man.
The phone ringing roused him from his thoughts of this week and he grabbed it. A voice on the other end told him that he might like to know that another Congressman had just gotten sick this week and died tonight. Then the phone line went dead.
He brought up the picture of the note he had received just a couple of days ago. The one that said that if he was smart he would just let it all go. Right then he decided that he wasn’t smart. No doubt about...it.
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