“Canonical Victims” by Carson Winter

I heard him before I saw him. A stop-start scream that chk-chk-chk’d like a stuttering lawn sprinkler. Full-throated, punctuated with glottal stops, high-pitched. “Ahh! Ahh! Ahh!”

I was in a coffee shop, curled up in warm neon. Rain came down so hard it looked like the white lines in a comic panel. I turned my head from my book, tucked my hair behind my ear, and adjusted my glasses, all very calmly, because I was practiced at being an urban adult. I didn’t want to appear surprised or concerned when I looked out the window, across the street, and saw the man holding his throat.

As blood coughed out from between his fingers, I saw movement behind him. Instantly, in a detached, intelligent manner, I thought, Oh, that must be the murderer. 

I took a drink of coffee and raised a polite finger to the waitress. “Excuse me,” I said. “I think that man might need help.”

The man fell to the ground, knees first. He reached out with a desperate hand, as if he was trying to ask us to do something, which annoyed me somewhat. What could we do besides what we were doing?

The waitress had already dialed the police. There was nothing left to do. We weren’t doctors.

Red and blue lights flashed through the heavy rain, sirens wailed. Police cars screeched to a stop. 

I sat and waited, drinking my coffee, which the waitress topped off, thankfully. 

When an officer came in, he looked at me first. I smiled at him and folded the top corner of my book and closed it. 

He cleared his throat. Then, said, “Miss, did you see what happened here?”

I nodded. “Someone cut his throat.”

“Did you see who?”

“He took off down the alley.”

He paused for a moment and scribbled my comments on a notepad. Outside, they threw a sheet over the corpse. 

“Could you describe his scream?”

~

I went out the next night knowing there was a murderer on the loose. Most of us did, because death was part of living in the city. My friends and I spoke about it at length—the murderer, not the death. 

“You saw him?”

“Sort of,” I said. 

“What victim was this?”

“The sixth, I think.”

My other friend chimed in. “The sixth canonical victim. There could be more.”

“There will be more,” said another. 

We laughed at that, even though we weren’t supposed to. When I walked home that night, I was drunk, but carefree. Really, we all were. 

My heels clicked against the sidewalk; I passed the alley and held my breath. 

~

I was pulling the stuffing from a gash in my couch when I heard a knock on the door. Quickly, I covered the white fluff with a fleece blanket. “Hello?” I called. 

“Police.”

I unlocked both locks and opened the door a crack. It was the middle of the day and I was wearing sweats and a ratty shirt. I felt exposed, foul. There was something coldly professional about the two officers in my doorway. 

“Ma’am, we have some questions.”

“About the man?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, go ahead.”

They asked me a series of questions involving the timeline. They asked me if I saw how the man’s throat was cut. I did not. They asked me if the man said anything to me. He did not. They asked if I could describe the killer. I could not. 

“Is that all?” I asked. 

“No.”

“Okay.”

“Are you sure it was the man who screamed?”

I thought for a moment. “I assumed it was. Maybe I was wrong.”

“Did you see his mouth move and did sound come out?”

“I didn’t see that, no.”

The two officers nodded to each other. “Okay,” said one. 

“Stay safe,” said the other. 

And then they were gone. 

~

At the coffee shop, where I drank my own reflection in the silky surface of black espresso, I considered the place where the dead man fell. I replayed the events in my head. In some way, as a witness, I felt connected to the comings and goings of this murderer. I was part of the story now and I was reminded of it constantly. People were asking me about what I saw and I had very little to say. It didn’t feel right. 

In the newspaper, an anonymous witness—me—described the attack dispassionately. I ran my hands through my hair and thought about pulling some out when I read that. No, that makes me sound cold. I’m not cold, I thought. No cop or reporter asked me if I cried into my pillow the night after, or if I was scared to walk alone. Of course I was, but also, you become acclimated to these sorts of things. It can come off as cold in print, when really, it’s just familiarity. 

In front of me, I had five other newspapers. I worked my way backwards. 

~

Number 5

This was a woman. I found that comforting, in an odd way. It wasn’t at night, but the early morning. She was walking her dog. I liked the night and didn’t want to be fearful of it. I laughed to myself at first, because there was at least one good thing that came from her death. Her throat was slit and I touched my own throat when I read over the description. The knife went quite deep apparently. 

Number 4

A man walking home alone at night. Disappointment reared inside me. His throat was slit, but they do not know how. I don’t know how you can not know that. The newspapers said, with some desperation, “Please, if you know anything, do not hesitate to share.”

I sighed. I already said all I could. 

Number 3

This one died in a church tower. She was a nun and she was praying. There was a certain sentimental charm to that, because I didn’t know anyone who prayed. I certainly didn’t. The paper printed a picture of her blood-stained habit. 

Number 2

The Frantic Man, The Bleeder. This one had nicknames. The paper hadn’t confirmed that his sliced neck was part of a pattern. Therefore, there was a certain perverse joy in the article. He was found in an abandoned building. He nearly painted the peeling walls with his blood. Brilliant spatter marked his frenzied pace through the quiet room where his life had ended. I had to admit—the room was stunning. 

Number 1

Finally, number one. The original canonical victim. I liked this one the best because it seemed the most regular. Here was a woman in her own house, killed by someone she most likely knew. They confirmed that it was a blade that cut into her throat, which was a relief. Trace amounts of metal were found lodged in her windpipe. She died in her bedroom, which is where I’d like to die as well. 

This was also the only murder with a witness—her two children. They waited in the bathroom tub while they listened to her mother’s scream from the other room. 

I put the paper down and shook a chill out from my spine as I imagined its stop-start rhythm. 

~

“How many victims now?” asked a friend. 

“Still six,” I said. 

“Incredible.”

“Yes,” I agreed. 

She looked at me like she had something to ask, but avoided the question. For a while, we spoke about our jobs, our apartments, but never about death. Eventually though, it came out. “Are you going to look for him?”

“Why would I?” I said, but I knew I should’ve asked what she meant. 

“You saw his work. You witnessed him.”

“Well, yes. But that doesn’t mean anything. I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. He probably didn’t even realize I was there.”

“That can’t be true. He must’ve.”
I realized now that my friend wanted it to be true. That the story was better if the killer had seen me, had marked me in some way. I played along. “He might’ve looked back once, just a glance. I think we locked eyes.”

She put down her drink. “No.”

“Yes,” I said. “I’m sure of it.”

“You’re so lucky,” she said. “That’s quite a story.”

“Yes,” I agreed. 

In the bar, there were hundreds of men. When I looked to see their faces, they all seemed to look away. I bit the flesh on the insides of my cheek. My friend smiled wickedly, like, see?

~

I called the police to ask about the children, the children of the first woman—the one who died in her bed. 

“Hello?” I said into the receiver. “I wanted to ask about the children, the children of the first canonical victim.”

There was a long pause, and a click. “How do you know about the children?”

“They were in the paper.”

Another pause. “Right,” said the voice. “Right.”

“Are they okay? I wanted to visit them, talk to them.”

“We can’t discuss that with you,” said the voice. “Is there anything else?”

“Well, no.”

Dial tone. I found the sound grating, vicious—like all sounds. 

~

My friends agreed that I should do what I could to strengthen my bond to the narrative. We didn’t talk about death often, because we weren’t as young as we used to be. We talked around death now. We talked about murders and car crashes but avoided the acknowledgment of the end. 

At night, I visited the crime scenes of those canonical victims and strengthened my narrative. Sometimes, I tricked myself into hearing the clicking heels of Chelsea boots, the groaning breaths of a mad man, the whisper of a razor halving rain drops. But every time I turned around, there was nothing. 

~

I found myself back inside my favorite coffee shop. I was curled up by the window, reading a book that was not about death. I was the only patron at that hour. The waitress seemed more interested in whatever was in the backroom. Her giggles traveled through the walls, she spoke rapidly to a friend, coworker, or lover. 

So entranced she was with her conversation, that she did not appear when the door chimed. I looked up from my book very briefly. It was a man, short with round glasses. His hair was thin and spackled to his forehead from the rain. I nodded to him, because he looked at me, and he nodded back. 

The waitress said, from a distance. “No, no—that can’t be.” But she said it while laughing. 

The man walked toward me and I felt my heart stutter—a stop-start rhythm. 

He smiled wanly and sat across from me in the booth. Every one of my muscles went rigid. Dark circles formed a purple outer ring to his full moon spectacles. 

I said, “Who are you?” 

He shook his head, like that was an answer. Then, he opened his mouth. 

A scream. Shrill, staccato. A woman’s scream coming from his lips. His face contorted as if he had become the mask of death from which he stole that awful noise. Instinctively, I recoiled, scrambled out of the booth. “Ahh! Ahh! Ahh!” the scream spritzed from his mouth like a second language. And as it did, my neck opened with a secret pair of lips. 

I thrashed, clawed at my own throat. I could not scream. I was on the floor, kicking and screaming my own scream—a single long vowel. 

From the other room, the giggling stopped. The waitress came bounding out, just in time to see the man leave. I looked at her, like, help me. 

But she couldn’t help, she wasn’t a doctor. She called the police. 

I tried to remain calm. I stretched and didn’t think about the man. She would be worried, this waitress. She didn’t sign up for this. As I bled onto the cold tile floor, I attempted a smile, to calm her. That’s what I would have wanted. I wouldn’t want to think about death. I’d want to think everything would be okay. She looked out after the man, who disappeared into the night, and became a part of the story. I waved my arms at her, to make her look back at me, to refocus her, just in time for the end.