Justified

By Kali Amanda Browne

A literary ménage à trois of crime story, noir and biting satire.

The story of an ordinary man caught in an extraordinary life. Edmond Styles awoke one Thursday morning and walked to work – to a job he detested. By the end of that day, he found himself held hostage at gunpoint by a disgruntled civil servant. Before the night fell, two people were dead and Edmond Styles began a journey that proverbially lasts 15 minutes. By that evening’s 11 o’clock news, the whole city had begun speculating about the survivor.

By turns funny, illuminating, heartbreaking and all too human, “Justified” is a universal story except for the extraordinary man at the center of it. The book follows the journey of one man through the tragic incident; the investigation; and the news cycle, as he finds himself both vilified and made a household name in the space of 72 hours. He then travels from Brooklyn to Los Angeles to clear his name and hilarity ensues during his sentimental journey.

“It is a simple crime story that quickly turns into a dark comedy with quite a few laugh out loud moments set firmly in popular culture,” said Kali Amanda Browne, the author. “At its core, anyone who has ever had a job they hated will find themes they can relate to.”

• Language: English
• Publisher: Kali Amanda Browne
• Release date: Apr 11, 2011
• ISBN: 9781458124630

Kali Amanda Browne

Kali Amanda Browne was born in New York City; grew up in Puerto Rico; and she came of age and currently resides in Brooklyn, NY. Above all, she tries to laugh even at adversity. She is a writer, food enthusiast, devoted daughter, nerd, pagan, wild woman...

Book preview

PREFACE

It was an ordinary afternoon in late November.

Outside it was a sadly gray day, accented by falling leaves of a variety of metallic hues that littered the streets of Brooklyn.

In the municipal building, the day shift was quietly ending – some workers had already left for the day. It was a Thursday and many of them were rejoicing in the coming weekend (One more day to TGIF!)

However, in one office on the fifth floor there was no ordinary business going on. A tragedy was unfolding.

A loud bang rudely interrupted the usual quiet of the late afternoon.

A gunshot?

Many looked up immediately, trying to identify the hellish sound. Then, two more explosions in rapid succession. Panic had begun when several people fully realized there were gunshots in their general vicinity.

Then, as the murmurs intensified, a scream echoed across the corridor – primal in its rawness – and three more shots. Three shots so close to one another they seemed to come in breathless desperation.

Then, a barrage of shots – ten, 12, 15 it became impossible to keep track. The scream lasted a few more seconds past the last shot and then stopped.

People who’d been caught completely by surprise by this invisible event felt their blood run cold, their adrenaline released (then the fleeing instinct hit), and finally pandemonium took over.

Edmond Styles was found cowering on the floor, with a death grip on the pistol, and tears streaming down his face. His boss, still sitting upright on her ergonomic chair, was covered in blood, and quite dead. A few feet from the desk, a young man lay in a pool of blood.

~ ~ ~ ~

CHAPTER 1

It was an ordinary Thursday, busy and exhausting and full of strife. Paloma Kowalksi, the unit’s director, sat at her throne inches above her bullpen, her eyes darting nervously as she stage-whispered into the phone.

She thought she was being subtle, but subtlety normally escaped her. Her manner tended towards the vulgar although she fancied herself refined in her ways.

She was just gossiping with a friend, which is to say she was name-dropping to impress the person on the other side of the call. The staff was too busy to be bothered. They had grown accustomed to her ways. They continued to work furiously to clear another deadline.

Edmond Styles was finishing a conference call when he saw the flash of a moving body enter the anteroom of their office suite. Someone came in and moved out of his field of vision for a few minutes.

Marisol and Rae were going over a checklist of paperwork for the following week’s meeting with union officials. Claire was working on a mailing. Deirdre could be heard on a hilarious phone call that appeared to be an Abbott and Costello routine (specifically the classic Who’s on first).

Edmond stood and turned to The Hag – his pet name for Paloma, whom he said looked like the witch in an Austrian production of Hansel und Gretel he saw back in the 1970s. The fact was that she had a garden variety fairy tale witch look to her: she was impossibly thin and bony with sunken beady eyes, an almost muddy pallor and lifeless hair.

He gave her the time out signal. She smirked and turned her gaze to the side, pretending (in a not-so-subtle way) not to see him. He walked over to her desk and knocked on its surface – something he knew annoyed her. She put her hand over the mouthpiece, the poor man’s hold button, and glared impatiently.

What is it? Can’t you see that I am in the middle of something?

Ed took a deep breath and resisted the urge to explode once and for all, and express all his general displeasure with her mere presence in the universe. Because, if he could voice it, he’d tell her that she was offensive to the idea of a just God, that she was the very personification of vulgarity and hatefulness. She was the proverbial Ugly American and he’d gladly kick her teeth in if he weren’t a gentleman. At the very least, he dreamed of giving her the finger.

His face never betrayed his true feelings and he simply continued the conversation he’d started, Did you schedule a late day appointment?

She shook her head and immediately dismissed Edmond with the flick of the wrist, and returned to her phone call.

Yes, yes, exactly, she said, that’s what I heard too! She is having an affair with the guy from the union and somebody at the mayor’s office saw them coming out of a motel in Jersey last week…

Edmond turned away from The Hag, this time the displeasure showed and it transformed his face into an ugly map of obvious loathing. All lines pointed to pure, unadulterated hate if you looked closely.

To a casual observer what happened next must have looked like an absurd ballet.

Edmond turned to face the door to investigate the reason for the late afternoon visit, as Claire took the mail and began to walking towards the reception area to drop the envelopes in the bin ahead of him.

Claire had just cleared the threshold when she stopped abruptly. She dropped 200 envelopes and these cascaded around her until she looked to Ed like she was nested in place as they settled around her feet. She raised her right hand to her chest and let her left arm down and Ed thought she looked like a parody of Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus. It was an odd thought but not for Ed--who came up with cultural references as a matter of course.

A dark stain appeared and grew on the seat of her pants, and Ed stood for a moment unable to look away but unaware of what was happening yet.

Claire began to move again, and this was the moment their day took on a bizarre aspect. She was moon walking, slowly backing into the room.

Edmond stood dumbfounded for a moment, and decided that he needed to take a step forward to intercept her when the barrel of the gun entered his field of vision and he froze.

Claire was making an odd sound which he quickly recognized as both praying and pleading – two separate conversations with God and the gunman. In her hysteria she found herself speaking rapidly, breathlessly and barely over a whisper, Oh-Lord-please-protect-me-oh-god-sir-please-don’t-kill-me!

Having a gun pointed at you is an act of terror, a threat of unimaginable violence, pain and possible death. As Claire tried desperately to bargain and cope simultaneously, Ed had the distinct impression that the gun looked like a cannon to her. At that moment, nothing else existed and nothing was bigger except possibly the mercy of God and she wanted to reach Him before harm reached her.

She was halfway into the room and the gunman was entering it. Edmond grabbed her by the elbow and shook her gently. He spoke with a decisiveness the others rarely ever heard, Relax.

He led her to a chair and commanded her to sit. She dropped into the seat in shock. Simple, authoritative commands would give her a sense of presence so she wouldn’t lose herself in that dissociative state of near catatonia. She needed to know she wasn’t alone.

As a rule, people see a gun up close and they panic. This particular weapon was a Glock 22 and it was so obviously not a toy. And as guns go, the Glock was a very menacing artifact. The fact that it was a dull black only added to its sinister nature. The almost five inches of barrel simply looked bigger and wider and badder than anything of its size.

Edmond quickly reflected that this person had 15 opportunities to make a bloody point, perhaps 17, and he damned his knowledge of trivia for putting that thought in the forefront of his mind.

The gunman wasn’t as sturdy as his piece. He was quite obviously not an experienced shooter: he held the gun as if he was trying to put distance between himself and the thing. He was tense and a little jittery, unsure of himself.

He obviously wanted to be heard. This was a desperate attempt to assert his right to be heard, but he had no plan. He only got as far as spending about $500 on the gun, coming to the office and demanding to be heard. He had not thought beyond that.

Now, he was clutching a worn out accordion file tucked under his forearm. He had a stronghold with his left hand but it also looked like an effortless grip despite the awkward angle.

Ed was struck by this for a moment and realized, He’s left-handed. Of course, this explained the tenuous grasp of the revolver. His obvious inexperience with a gun gave Ed the impression that perhaps he thought it must be held by the right hand.

The gunman stood there in a suit that was a little too big and a little worn out, probably a thrift shop purchase, staring at the five women and Edmond. Almost a full minute had passed and silence was threading a delicate balance between sanity and the bizarre.

Edmond stepped up to the challenge because no one else seemed willing or capable.

You have our full attention, he said. He spoke clearly and calmly. Now you have to tell us what you want because we don’t know what is happening or why.

From the back, at the throne that sat on a platform above the rest of the room, Paloma said, We don’t negotiate with terrorists.

Edmond’s head snapped back and he stared her down wanting more than ever to bitch slap her.

I AM NOT A TERRORIST!

The gunman responded by accentuating each syllable with a wave of his gun like it was a freaking baton. But he wasn’t conducting an orchestra. He was holding a gun. And Ed knew by looking at the extractor that it was loaded, at least it had one in the chamber.

This man needed to be handled carefully. Of course, Paloma remained unaware of this simple fact, which is why Edmond also called her The Mouth -- due to her propensity to say the most insensitive and inappropriate things when she spoke to people she considered beneath her (and most humans were, apparently).

Edmond suddenly felt an urge to duct tape her just to keep her quiet. The woman inspired all sorts of fantasies but not the ones she presumed. She was a demonic muse.

The result of the gunman’s outburst was more whispered prayers and whimpering from the staff, and a derisive snort from The Hag. This did nothing to calm or clarify the situation.

Instead, it caused the gunman to retreat into his own madness. He started sweating and beating the side of his head with the weapon; then he made a guttural sound of anguish and pointed the gun back at them.

YOU! You make me do this!

Edmond glared at Paloma hoping it would be enough to shut her up and knowing the narcissist – who so loved hearing the sound of her own voice – would probably get them all killed at the hands of a madman. Worst, they would die and never knowing why. He was silently repeating his daily mantra: Burst into flames, bitch!

Ed often thought that perhaps if he’d been more devout and phrased it in the form of a prayer she would actually ignite and put him out of his misery. He had never met a more repugnant creature and he wished he could crush her like a bug, eliminating her offensive presence in his world.

In response, she sucked her teeth; a derisive little gesture that released so much contempt into the atmosphere you could smell the putrid acridness (unless of course it was a side effect of her latest horrifying fad diet).

The gunman missed it or ignored it. He waved the thick file over his head.

"This is all wrong!"

He walked past Edmond and slammed the file down on the desk, displacing some of the papers on it, the picture of Paloma’s grandchildren at Disney World, the wireless mouse, and several pens.

You tell lies and it cost me my job. You fix it or you will pay.

And there it was: terms and conditions in so many words. Paloma cast her eyes on Edmond as if daring him to handle it.

Ed put his hands together as in prayer, but it was a move designed to show a non-threatening stance to the man holding the gun.

Without knowing the full details, I cannot make an assessment.

Edmond spoke calmly and deliberately, each syllable fully articulated.

Right now, just by the frustration you have expressed to us, it sounds like it is likely that we are dealing either with a clerical error or resolutions going to you before all reports were synchronized correctly…

He had said nothing really, just stringing bureaucrat lingo to say he had no freaking idea, but it bought him time to think of a plan of action and measure the man holding the gun. It sounded reasonable just by the tone and as long as he felt someone was listening he’d be less eager to use the gun. At least, that was Edmond’s assessment of the man and the situation.

We need you to catch us up on what is happening, Ed continued, because right now you know more about it than we do. Let’s start with the original report, the grievance and the stipulation, please.

This did not relax the young man, but it refocused his guardedly frantic demeanor. He used his left hand with a magnificent fluidity, a strand of damp hair falling over from his perfectly coiffed mane and sticking to his wet forehead.

Edmond noticed the impossible blackness of the young man’s hair and barely remembered the days his own hair had been as full and as dark. He did envy the young man’s dark caramel complexion. Of course, that very condition made it easy for ignorant assholes such as Paloma to bandy about the terrorist accusation. Certainly his features put his origins in South Asia, Ed though.

As the gunman extracted papers from the file, Edmond glanced over his staff. Rae looked pale and Ed worried the old lady, a retiree that worked for them part time, was having a stroke. Marisol was an interesting sight. Usually exuberant, she was even breathing quietly.

A Colombian transplanted to the US in her late teens, Marisol shared her people’s cultural tendency towards contrarianism. Only Colombians in the whole of Latin America begin their sentences with, No! And if you dare challenge them, they voice their disagreement with the national irrefutable argument: ¡Pero no! (as in But no).

Marisol’s husband once told Edmond at a holiday party that it was a documented fact that in the 200 years since the declared independence of Colombia nobody had yet witnessed the silencing of a Colombian woman. This gunman was making history!

How odd, Ed thought. The things that pop into your head when stress levels are overwhelming!

Ed was really looking for an ally but a cursory look was discouraging. Deirdre was his bulldog, she could transform from polite church lady to disgruntled civil servant within seconds if needled.

She certainly did not suffer fools lightly and at the first sign of stupidity – or voluntary ignorance as Ed’s mother used to refer to it – Deirdre’s empathy would evaporate and turn into institutional contempt akin to a hardened prison guard.

Deirdre was brutal. She made big boys cry. Edmond saw her dismantle a union lawyer once; she cut him down to size and he crumbled. It was one of the most enjoyable days of the last year for Ed. But now Edmond saw that looking at the barrel of the gun had neutered her and she was leading the whispered prayers.

Meanwhile, the gunman remained jittery. His focus was divided