Josh: 'Cause Every Girl's Crazy 'Bout A Sharp Dressed European Minion Taking On John McClane In Nakatomi Tower (Cue ZZ Top Guitar Riff)

Mary and I were just getting into the car to head over to the Hollis Nursing Home while we still had a little daylight when she told me that I looked like Josh with freshly-shorn blond hair. This was bad, as the entire purpose of a disguise is that I not look like Josh at all. We then decided that on the way back to Hollis Crossroads we'd stop at one of those men's suit stores and get me a few new outfits.

An hour of measuring, modeling and bitching later (definitely not in that order) I strutted to the car wearing a sleek new suit and tie. Even though the shopping was over, the bitching most certainly was not.

ME: I look absolutely ridiculous. With this hair and suit I look like one of Alan Rickman's Eurotrash henchmen from Die Hard.

MARY: Who's Adam Rickman?

ME: How can you possibly not know-

MARY: Because I have a job?

ME: Touche. I tell you what, by the end of this week I will have educated you on the greatest action movie villains of all time. No need to thank me.

MARY: Fabulous. And then maybe I'll show you what a W2 form looks like.

The only reason I couldn't think of a good comeback was because I have a concussion. Now we're on our way to the nursing home.

Josh: You Can't Tell The Players Without A Scorecard, So I'm Making A Scorecard

Okay, time out. I feel like events are absolutely spinning out of control here and I need to get a handle on them. To recap and provide a time line (and correct me if any of this is out of whack, I may not be entirely accurate as I was just blown up last night):

-Over a decade ago, Doctor Shigekazu Yoshida and his assistant Tanaka begin experimenting with the Rabbit Calicivirus on Wardang Island, Australia, secretly releasing the infected test-subjects onto the continent and wiping out ninety-five percent of the rabbit population. He does this as a dry run to see how the virus would work if adapted for humans.

-Doctor Shigekazu Yoshida moves to Atlanta, Georgia and gains access to the Centers For Disease Control, or CDC (at right. Put up a boring, official government seal, eh, Mary? Well, two can play at that game!) This allows him to work to perfect the human Calicivirus strain with financial aid from (and I still find this just about impossible to believe) my father, Scott Howland.

-As Shigekazu and Tanaka are about to fly back to Japan with the formula that will essentially kill all human life on Earth, their car is hit by a semi truck. Doctor Shigekazu Yoshida is killed instantly while Tanaka is dragged off into the backwoods of a small town called Hollis Crossroads by The Old Man (I'm just going to go ahead and capitalize it. I thought of calling him "The Southern Gentleman" or "Colonel Sanders" or something, but frankly having dealt with him first-hand I'm way too terrified of him to get cute with a nickname). The Old Man rams a chisel into Tanaka's spine to paralyze him from the neck down, then spends the next year (!) teaching him to speak English.

-Meanwhile, six months or so later in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, a semi truck broadsides my parent's car, killing my father Scott and paralyzing my mother Cynthia from the neck down. This is the one that I cannot wrap my head around. The deliberate act six months before was to paralyze Tanaka... the random act six months later paralyzes my mother in precisely the same way.

-The aftermath of the attack is witnessed by Mrs. Justina Walentowicz, who just happens to be one of, if not the luckiest Bingo player in the state (B.I.N.G.O., B.I.N.G.O., B.I.N.G.O. and B.I.N.G.O. was his name-O. Good, hopefully now it's stuck in your head, too).

-My mom and I start investigating the crash, hiring Mary Stroud, a P.I. from Madison, Wisconsin. Mrs. Walentowicz gets interviewed a couple of times, then she's horrifically murdered, her head pulled down into her abdomen and up through a hole cut in her stomach. In her smiling mouth is a photograph of the semi truck she thought she saw drive away from the crash. Pushed up and into her brain is a freshly amputated rabbit's foot infected with the Calicivirus.

-In researching the rabbit's foot and trying to narrow down where it came from, we contact Wardang island and acquire the number for Doctor Shigekazu Yoshida's son, Kisho. In addition to having a charming, bubbly personality, Kisho is set to identify the virus of that particular rabbit's foot and determine which continent it came from (and by the way, I'm ready to just call that one over and say it came from Wardang Island. Test away, but I have no doubt). In conversation with Kisho, we find out about his father and the semi truck attack.

-I fly down to Atlanta to get Shigekazu's notes on what we think are the rabbit Calicivirus and also to poke around a bit and get more information on his murder. Mary stays in Milwaukee to keep in touch with Detective Ward, the officer in charge of the Walentowicz case, and also secretly to investigate my family, her own employers (sneaky monkey).

-While recovering Shigekazu's research, a man with an Australian accent leaves me a note giving an address in a small town called Hollis Crossroads and a reference to Tanaka. Meanwhile, Mary discovers that my father wrote Shigekazu a check for three million dollars.

-Sh*t gets weird in Hollis Crossroads to say the very least. What up until this point I considered to be a murder investigation turned into an absolute horror show. So much happened out at that damn house I think I'm going to spend years unraveling it and undoubtedly trying to suppress it. The Old Man killed my bodyguard and essentially framed me for it, Tanaka was unknowingly covered with centipedes (and was there special meaning behind that? I mean, it was beyond creepy and gives me the heebie-jeebies just thinking about it, but did they have some significance beyond that?) and The Old Man's assistants killed Tanaka and themselves all while wearing the same smile Mrs. Walentowicz had (I believe I called it one part amused, one part amazed and one part batsh*t crazy. I'm standing by that description). Finally, we learned beyond a shadow of a doubt that I way-overuse parentheses (true).

-Finally, The Old Man was humming the bingo song (was his name-O) which, along with the matching smiles reminded us of poor Mrs. Walentowicz. Mary called her daughter, found out just how awesome a bingo player she really was and learned that she had been given a special offer to join a retirement community for great bingo players only: a rest home that just happened to be located in Hollis Crossroads. Mary and I are going to go and check it out tonight under the pretense of a married couple considering putting her mother in the home.


The thing I can't stop thinking about is the fact that the murderer driving the semi (Let's just call him The Driver from now on, k?) who killed both my and Kisho's father probably saved the world by doing so. Whoever he is, he and The Old Man are cold-blooded murderers and utter monsters... but are they really the good guys here? I'm going to do my best to bring them to justice, but is that even really the right thing to do?

Also, things happened at that house that I cannot begin to explain. Was most of it a trick somehow? A carefully crafted illusion? Or was it something more? If it was... if it was really what I think it was, then what chance do we have?

Okay, I feel more up to speed. Not better, particularly, but more up to speed. Time in.

Mary: A Conversation With Sharon Walentowicz

October 29th, 2008: I'm going to adopt Josh's mode of putting a conversation into a log-type format here. I just finished speaking on the phone with Mrs. Walentowicz's only daughter, Sharon, back in Milwaukee.


ME: Thank you so much for taking my call. Detective Ward gave me your number, and I only have a few questions, things that probably won't seem too important. I just want to get some more background in the hopes that it will help us find your Mother's murderer.

SHARON WALENTOWICZ: Okay, go ahead.

ME: This question is going to sound incredibly frivolous, but I wanted to ask about your Mom and the game of Bingo.

SHARON: (laughs) Okay, I did not expect you to ask that. I'm not sure what you want to know. She played it all the time, down at the casino, at church, wherever. It was her favorite thing to do, to pass the time. Old people love it.

ME: Did she play for big money? Were you worried about her losing?

SHARON: Yes and no. Meaning, yes she played for big money and no I wasn't worried. She won often.

ME: How often? A lot more than the other players?

SHARON: Let me put it this way, you know her house? Paid for with Bingo winnings. Same with her car. Same with my car, which she bought for me last year. She had to be the luckiest player in Wisconsin. All the old ladies knew her over at the hall. (Begins crying) I'm sorry. I'm sorry, it's just so soon. I still can't believe it. Are you any closer to finding her killer?

ME: We're... doing everything we can, believe me. Was she involved with anyone... I don't know how to ask this... anyone shady? Someone you didn't like, or who made you nervous?

SHARON: Not really. Some of the Bingo ladies were jealous of all her winning, of course, but they weren't bad people, and my Mom never rubbed it in anyone's face. She would always get offers from other Bingo halls, some big places to come and play there. She was famous in her own little world. There was even a discounted offer for her to join a retirement home especially for big bingo enthusiasts. Isn't that just the weirdest thing you ever heard?

ME: Only if you tell me it was in Atlanta.

SHARON: No, no. (Laughs) I don't know why you'd think that was strange. No, it was just in some town, Hollis something-or-other. Hello? Miss Stroud? Hello?

ME: ...Thank you for your time. Thank you. I'll be in touch.

Mary: The Safe Was Not

October 28th, 2008: I have just returned to my little motel in Hollis Crossroads after a round-trip journey to Atlanta, where I spent a good half-hour bluffing the desk clerk into giving me Yoshida's file box from the hotel safe. I used three bluffs at the same time where I probably should have only used one, but it worked. I claimed to be an employee of Josh's, acting on behalf of the police and pregnant, desperate for the medical forms inside the box for the sake of my unborn child. It appears that the collective impression of the overall competence of the people of Georgia has finally taken a hit.

Regardless, we got what we needed, and so I have a quick question for you, Mrs. Howland. If you still retain possession of your husband's checkbook, is there any notation for check number one thousand, three hundred and eighteen?

Yoshida: 5

The sooner I have the box the sooner I can identify the strain of Calcivirus within the rabbit's foot, Stroud. Try and remember that.

I have taken an interest in the town and surrounding area of Hollis Crossroads. Examining numbers taken from admittedly unreliable Internet sources, I have been cross-referencing them extensively and found them to be anomalous. Population density, the shifting of the local economy, mortality rates, local industry, tourism... all of these statistics when looked at and taken in as a whole are simply wrong. I have never seen its like. The town's population has stayed more or less the same ever since the town has been in existence, while jobs seemed to decline virtually to nothing over a hundred years ago. What is it that they do there? How is income generated? Their forests are rotted and useless for lumber, they have no mines, no mills, no craftsmen and nothing of any interest to any tourist. How is this town still alive? I want further raw data.

Stroud, go to the hall of public records and fetch me hard information, everything you can find about the township for the past hundred or so years. Building permits, zoning, marriage licenses and birth and death certificates.

Also, I want a sample of insects taken from around the town, preferably from within the forest.

Mary: The Long Journey

I wondered once whether I should be writing these in past or present tense, and found myself leaning toward the past. I have to write this post in the past tense. There needs to be the illusionary distance of time between what is now, and what was then. If I don't feel that distance, I'll never be able to finish writing this.

After a flight in which I forced myself to sleep, or at least doze off for an hour or so, I touched down at Stubbins Airport, which was really just a strip of tarmac next to the "terminal", a squat, rust-colored, brick building that was surprisingly clean and fresh-smelling. I was prepared to fight my way through loose livestock being herded between the bench seating when I arrived, and I found the fact that someone cared enough about this little strip in the middle of nowhere to take good care of it to be a bit humbling. I vowed to myself that I would do my best not to pre-judge anything else down here if I could help it.

I complimented the plump, overly made-up, middle-aged woman behind the rental counter on the condition of the airport and she gave a proud nod. "My husband, Arthur," she said in a thick drawl. "He likes it to sparkle. When, on rare occasion we get someone flying in from up North ways, they always look around like they can't believe there aren't pigs lying in the middle of the concourse."

I'm sure I blushed, feeling guilty and exposed for having been called out so expertly. To change the subject I asked, "I'm going to Hollis Crossroads-"

"Tsk. Yes, Ma'am. Darn shame." She shook her head sadly.

Staring at her confused, I asked, "Shame about what?"

She gaped at me, stunned that I didn't know what was happening in Hollis Crossroads despite the fact that I had just touched down literally right in front of her. "Why, about the fire. And the bodies."

My breath caught in my throat, my voice coming out as a whisper. "What bodies?"

"That old house-the old Hollis house burned right to the ground, and half the gosh-darned-pardon my French-forest right with it. It was all dried-up and rotted, and we hadn't had rain in so long... if I had to say, it has not rained in these parts for upwards of one entire month." She paused for a quick breath, then, "The last time it had gone that long without a rain-and I am not talking about a quick sprinkle or a drizzle, but an honest to goodness decent rain had to have been, oh, I want to say nineteen eighty-nine or so, and I told Billy-Ray at the fire station when he came by for the last inspection that if it didn't rain hard soon that there'd be-"

"Where?" I interrupted, my voice coming out as a hollow croak.

Once in my rental car- which was, again, surprisingly clean and fresh-smelling- I raced to the address she had given me despite her hurt feelings at being cut off from her story so abruptly. The town of Hollis Crossroads looked old but somehow stately, the paint peeling from rotting facades that I imagined once had a certain charm. I couldn't tell much more about the place as I shot through it at about seventy miles per hour, blowing right through the one and only stop sign without so much as a glance in either direction.

Heading south out of town the smell of smoke began to filter in through the heating vents. It was surprisingly cold, only 45 degrees, and I was glad that I hadn't changed out of my winter clothes, the remnants of Wisconsin that I didn't think I was going to need. As I drove around the winding, country roads, the smell of smoke began to be overpowering, permeating the car. It had a sweet, nostalgic scent that at first was quite pleasant but after a while became cloying and oppressive. At least, I thought, as long as the smell keeps getting stronger I know I'm going in the right direction.

The road turned from asphalt to gravel, and from gravel to dirt, the trees and brush on either side growing more and more wild as I drove, seeming to crowd the car. I imagined Josh driving down this same road at night, his headlights dancing wildly over the dark branches and brown leaves as his tires fell into one pothole after another.

As I was trying to shake these troubling images, I rounded a corner and found the old Hollis house, or what was left of it. It was still smoldering, with only a few charred timbers and the chimney left standing. Behind the house was a wood that was still partially on fire, and firemen sprayed down the edges of it to keep it from spreading. There were four fire trucks, an ambulance, two police cars, three Sheriffs cars, a hearse and a burned-out sedan that looked like it had exploded.

I pulled up and off to the side, and a Sheriff's Deputy strolled up with his hand raised, a gesture meaning both "hello" and "go no further". I parked and got out of the car, my Private Investigator badge in hand. I had no illusions about it carrying any weight here, but one never knew.

"Howdy," the Deputy said, attempting a little smile that only came off as glum. He was young, perhaps in his late 20's, blond and thin. His cheek was smudged with charcoal. I showed him my badge and he had the good manners to pretend to look impressed. He ushered me over to the Sheriff, a chubby, worried man with kind eyes in his late 40's, his mustache in need of a trim.

"Sheriff, I work for Mrs. Cynthia Howland of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Her son Josh was down here looking into some family business. Have you seen him? Josh Howland?" I tried to keep my hands at my sides and look as professional as possible, but my voice quavered at the last minute, betraying me.

The Sheriff nodded to me politely. "Ma'am." He scratched his neck absently and-as if he hadn't heard a word I just spoke- said, "Problem is, we ain't had no rain in a spell. That's the dang problem. But we just about got the fire controlled now, I'd say." Only pausing a moment, he continued, "Four bodies, three burned beyond recognition. Bad... bad." He shook his head and spat. "One murder for sure, the others... it's just damn hard to say exactly what. The two in the house, they were together, lying on a bed, husband and wife, though we didn't find no rings. They must have slept through the fire.

"Then there was the third one... he got himself killed inside the house and got... dragged out into the front yard. Body and murder weapon escaped the fire. The weapon was... in the body, so we should get plenty off it." He cleared his throat and spat again. "Damn, damn dirty business. We know who that fella is at least, by his I.D. Antrelle Harris, licensed bodyguard- we already called his company. They got some folks driving out now. You know, they take care of that Jay-Z fella when he comes to Atlanta? He dates that girl Beyonce." The Sheriff attempted a little smile, gave up quickly and spat again.

I put my hand on his forearm, my professional veneer finally cracking. "Sheriff, please. Josh. Please."

He looked at the ground solemnly, then nodded and said, "The car. The plates came back as rental, his car." He pointed to the scorched husk of shattered metal in the driveway. "He was... we'll need to run an autopsy, there wasn't much left. Body was inside, driver's seat." Seeing the tear that made its way down my face, he put his arm around me and murmured, "I'm sorry, darlin'. I am so, so sorry. He was special to you." It didn't come out as a question.

From far away I heard my voice say, "I guess he was. More than I thought." The Sheriff handed me a tissue and guided me over to his car, sitting me in the backseat with the door open. I had always made it a point to never cry while I worked, especially not around law enforcement, but right then I just didn't care. "This doesn't even feel like a job anymore." I hadn't meant to say it out loud.

I don't know how long I sat there, my eyes unfocused and watery. I heard the sounds of the firemen finishing up with the house and rolling up their hoses. I listened as the police wrestled with the corpses, loading them up for transport to the Medical Examiner. I sat and sat as one by one the fire trucks and police cars lumbered back up the dirt road heading for Hollis Crossroads.

A voice spoke, and after a while I listened to it. It was the blond Deputy. "Ma'am? Ma'am, you want to ride back with me? We could come back for your car later, if you like. Perhaps it would be best."

"I'll drive," I muttered. "I'm going to drive. I have to send a message. I have to tell his-" I started tearing up again, my voice catching, so I simply turned away, got in my car and drove. Somehow I found a motel in town (Don's Motel, Carlton Street) and staggered into my room.


Mrs. Howland, I am so, so very sorry. I will never forgive myself for not coming down here instead of him. Oh, God, I am just so sorry.

Mary: On My Way

My flight departs in two hours. I'm not even getting a hotel. I'll be picking up a rental car, driving straight to Hollis Crossroads and asking around. I wish I would have asked Josh what that address actually was. I wish I would have just gone down there right when I first read his post about the note. Damn, damn, damn.

Josh: I Need A Kevin Costner-Type From "The Bodyguard". Actually, Considering How His Career Is Going, I Could Probably Just Hire Kevin Costner

I woke up and yelled a word that would have been partially censored had I posted it when I saw that the time was 4:00 in the damn afternoon. I was so tired this morning that I fell asleep without setting an alarm. Mary, it's too late for you to fly down here in time for it to still be "today". I mapquested Hollis Crossroads, and it'll take me at least an hour and a half to drive there.

I've made up my mind to go to the meet, obviously. I took your advice about not going alone, though, and contacted a security firm I looked up here in Atlanta. It's obviously about as rush a job as you can get, and I shudder to imagine the bill that my Mom's going to get, but there is no way I'm going to some random spot in the middle of nowhere alone. I'll be picking up the bodyguard on my way out of town. (Below: the cat is the evil foe, the dog is my bodyguard and I'm the tiny, terrified, pampered, pathetic mouse in the baby carriage. Wait, this isn't helping me...)

Mary, your comment about the mystery man's accent possibly being Japanese made me finally recognize what the accent actually was. It wasn't Japanese- in fact, that suggestion worked for me because the accent sounded essentially like the exact opposite of Japanese. It was Australian. Guess that rules out it being the lab assistant Tanaka, unless he learned to speak English while working with your father on Wardang Island, Kisho. Did he?

I'm out of time. Just in case, I'm storing the entire file box in the hotel safe. I don't want to take a chance on taking it with me and losing it. I'll give you an update on the Blackberry when I get to this place, assuming I get any reception there. It looks pretty rural and remote. Wish me luck.

Josh: The ATL

Typing on the Blackberry while waiting an eternity for my rental car at Atlanta Hartsfield-Jackson Airport...

Did flying always suck? I mean, you see those posters from back in the halcyon days of the 50's and 60's of people actually smiling on airplanes, and there's a sexy stewardess handing them trays full of edible food, and it doesn't appear, looking out the tiny window that they've been taxiing around a runway for five hours. Was it actually like that, or was that just highly effective propaganda? Is the past just a lie? I see the same type of advertisements like that now for airlines, with grinning passengers and sunshine beaming through the windows, and let's just say that's not an entirely accurate picture of reality. At this point, a more timely, comfortable and customer service-conscious mode of transportation would be hitchhiking.

Speaking of propaganda and preconceptions, I'm not all that wild about traveling to the South. It's my first time here, and as a Northerner who bases his entire worldview on the movies I've seen, the South gives me the creeps. Southern people think (generalizing? mmmaybe) that Yankees like me are so jealous of their quaint, gentrified, countrified way of life. That we pine for the lovely southern belles like Scarlett O'Hara (played by Vivian Leigh, a Brit, by the way) and yearn to stroll down by the old crick under the weeping willows while our slaves mournfully belt out some classic Blues as we sip gimlets and chain-smoke tobacceee cigarettes we grew and rolled ourselves.

Northerners do not think the South is or ever was like this. That's not the Hollywood myth we bought into. For the most part, we think the South is crawling with toothless, shirtless, illiterate, Waffle House-patronizing, hopelessly-inbred rapists. Sorry to burst your bubble, any Southerners who happen to have someone to help you translate what these little squiggles on the computer screen mean.

I know this preconception probably won't last long and I certainly hope it won't. Actually, so far Atlanta (okay, the airport) looks just like any other American city, with the exception that the security guards are wearing possum-fur hats.

No, really, so far it's been-

Car is here. Finally. Damn it, I didn't order a pickup truck with a drooling bloodhound riding shotgun and a wooden rocking chair for a back seat!

More as I go...


...At the stoplight... McDonald's... Starbucks... same buildings you'd see anywhere else...

A Waffle House! Aha!


...Now at the hotel, totally exhausted. I'm glad I waited to send this post. Please forgive all the previous jackassery and Confederacy-bashing and understand that I'm running on absolutely no sleep. Despite this, I'm dying to see what's in the storage locker. I'm going to grab my tenth cup of coffee and drive over to it. It's only a few blocks away anyway.


...And I'm back once more at the hotel after my trip to the storage area. To recap:

I was amazed at how bright all the lights of Atlanta were even late into the night, and was considering heading downtown to check out all the action before realizing that all the light was actually dawn. Crap. Overall, Atlanta looks like everywhere else in America. Everyone has been friendly, helpful and sporting an acceptable number of teeth. I'm not sure why I'm disappointed.

You had to enter a security code to get in the gate, a nice setup that must have set back the Doctors Yoshida a fair amount of Yen. Once inside the gate, I drove the rental car up to the storage garage, parked, and used the same code to get into the individual storage area, which was about the size of a walk-in closet.

Once inside, I found a grand total of one box containing file folders. Again, disappointed. I admit I was kind've hoping for racks of beakers containing weird liquids, cages filled with bunny skeletons, and/or the Ark of the Covenant. A box of file folders. Whoop-de damn doo.

As I began to rifle through the box, I heard a car engine outside. Peeking out, I saw a black sedan driving up to the security gate out in front, a spotlight attached to the driver's side window sweeping over the storage area. I had every right to be where I was, but for whatever reason I started freaking out a little. Then the front gate began to slide open and the car crept forward, the spotlight darting back and forth over the asphalt in front of it. Maybe it was because I was so short on sleep and in a "foreign land", so to speak, or perhaps it was something about the car, the way it rolled up so very slowly, but acting on instinct I lowered the garage-style door to Doctor Yoshida's storage area and knelt down inside, my ear to the metal door.

I could hear the rubber on the tires squeak as the car pulled up in front of my door and stoped, the transmission shifting into Park. I held my breath as it idled for a long moment, then the car door opened. My breathing was rapid and shallow as I heard footsteps coming closer and closer until whoever it was was standing right outside the metal door on the other side of me.

I heard a voice. I was surprised to hear that it didn't sound Southern, but instead had a completely different accent I couldn't place. His speech had a professional, even military cadence. I pressed my ear harder to the door and could barely make out what he said: "Red raw to blower. Bongo, advise." A pause, then, "Acknowledged. Knock at the door need to know only. There's-" I couldn't make out anything else as he started walking away, back to his car. The car door shut, and I could hear it slowly drive off. Just in case, I waited in silence inside the storage area until I thought I could distantly hear the front security gate open and close.

It occurred to me at this point that my rental car was parked right where he was just standing, and I hoped that he hadn't slashed the tires or something. I gently opened the storage door, sighing with relief that I actually could open it from inside, something I hadn't considered when I panicked and shut myself in.

Giving my car the once-over and deciding that everything looked normal, I tossed the file box in the backseat and threw it into drive before noticing a slip of paper stuck underneath the windshield. Without getting out, I rolled down the window, reached out and grabbed it. I turned on the dome light and read it. It was an address in someplace called "Hollis Crossroads", followed by the words, "Tanaka. Today."

Now back at the hotel, the adrenaline rush has given way to utter exhaustion. Before I pass out, Doctor Yoshida, does the name Tanaka mean anything to you? My eyes are closing even as I'm sitting here. Too tired to process what happened. Please advise.