Discombobulate

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Sheriff Winston was awake when his alarm clock went off. This was the day he had been dreading, it was Friday. Today, Susan and Jennifer would be taken to a lab and given autopsies. Everything would be different after today. 

Winston was out the door by seven with a granola bar in his hand. He'd be having his breakfast to go. The exhuming process wasn't supposed to start until eight. That wouldn't stop the press from showing up early. 

The sun had another forty minutes before it'd rise. The goal was to exhume the caskets without the public around. In this case, that'd be impossible. The case had been huge when it happened. Detective Mullen said it took a month and a half before the press started to die down. 

It was foolish to believe they'd be silent today. Only a few people knew about the exhuming, but there was no doubt about it; someone would leak the information to the media. 

Winston climbed into the sheriff's car, buckled his seatbelt, and sped off to the cemetery. It would only take five minutes to get there. He needed to remove the press before Denise showed up. 

It wasn't easy to see the exhuming of your loved ones. It'd be a lot worse with blinding camera lights and yelling. Microphones pointed in your face and questions thrown out in every direction. It'd be a nightmare. 

Rain trickled down from the sky. The windshield wipers wiped wet specks from Winston's view. The weather had been up in the air. A few days ago, Friday was supposed to be sunny. Obviously, the rain painted a different picture. 

Winston finished the last bite of his granola bar right as he pulled up to the stone path. The cemetery was a circus. Seven different news station vans were parked near the graves. His tires crunched over gravel as he pulled closer to the noise. 

Camera lights flashed along the dark graves. Shadows danced over the area. The living meandered between the rows of dead. Winston opened his door, he could already hear the chattering. The attention turned to him after he slammed his door shut. 

"Sheriff Winston, is it true that you're exhuming the bodies of Susan and Jennifer Houghton?" 

The shutter of a camera went off. It wasn't only the news stations with their fancy video cameras. A few people stood with camera equipment around their necks and in their hands. Another flash came from the other side of him. 

"Sheriff Winston, do you know who murdered the Houghtons?" 

He put up his hand to shield himself from another flash. 

"Do you have time to answer the questions I didn't get to ask you the other day?" The red-headed girl, that knocked on his door, was standing towards the front. Her red hair stood out among the flashes. 

"Winston! Thank god you showed up early! We could use your help over here!"

Winston looked over to see Detective Mullen rushing towards him. 

"One of the reporters keeps heckling one of the diggers." Mullen bent over and put his hands on his knees. "She keeps trying to go inside the tent. There are no other officers around. It's verbal assault currently, but if you don't stop it, it's going to get physical." 

Winston grabbed his hat and tilted his head up to the sky. He mumbled a quick prayer under his breath. He blinked as a cold raindrop hit the middle of his forehead.

"Sheriff Winston!" Someone called out again. "Why is there a tent over the graves? Why can't we see the exhuming process? What are you hiding from the public?" 

Vultures. The media was exactly like vultures. They were scattered around the two graves. Hooting and hollering like the scavenging birds, begging to see the process, to have a chance to film and snap photos; roaming around the cemetery to find a better view.