Free Flashback by Jenny Siler Page A

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    The apartment was neat as a pin. Several feet down the front hall a tiny galley kitchen opened off to the left, its open shelves revealing a sparse but orderly collection of dishes and pans, an English teapot, a handful of chopsticks upright in a water glass like blossomless flowers. Farther along, to the right, was the tiny bathroom, no tub or shower, just a rust-stained sink and a toilet.
    Aside from these two rooms, there was just the living room, which evidently served as bedroom and dining room and office as well. In one corner was a simple sleeping mat, its pillows and blankets neatly arranged. A Macintosh PowerBook sat open on the little table by the window.
    Some part of me had expected to see Joshi as he’d been that morning, in his proper pajamas and robe. But he was fully dressed, in wool pants, a knit vest, a white oxford shirt, and a tie. Except for the lack of sunglasses, he looked much the same as he had when I’d met him on the street. On his feet were the familiar orange running shoes with their glittery laces. His right hand, the hand I’d seen from the hallway, was extended above his head, as if he was doing the backstroke across the carpet. He lay face-up, his eyes staring at the ceiling, one knee bent at an unnatural angle. On his neck was a thin dark line, a crease where someone had taken a cord or a wire and pulled it hard enough to stop his breathing.
    When I had first arrived at the convent, one of the older sisters, a nun named Ruth, had died in her sleep. As far as I could remember, this had been my only experience with death. Sister Ruth had been old and frail, in the twilight of her nineties, and she had been heard in the chapel sometimes, praying for the end. When she finally did go, there was an earnest peacefulness to her corpse, an illusion, almost, of joy in passing.
    There was nothing peaceful about Joshi. My first full glimpse of him repulsed me; I could smell the violence of his death. But I was fascinated as well, momentarily rooted in place by the grim sight, caught between my own curiosity and the urge to flee. Run, I told myself. It took a moment for me to obey my own command, but I finally turned and started back down the hall.
    I had left the apartment’s door ajar when I entered, and as I passed the kitchen I saw the light in the stairwell come on. I stopped short and strained my ears. Down at the bottom of the stairs a body shifted, clothes rustling as it started upward, the sound of feet on the steps magnified by the stairwell’s hard walls and tall ceiling.
    I took a breath and caught it, then ducked into the little kitchen. A European woman stood out in this part of Tangier, and the last thing I wanted was to be seen leaving the apartment of a dead man. Placing myself just inside the kitchen’s doorway, I counted the person’s steps. If whoever it was stopped on the second floor, I’d be okay.
    But the steps kept coming, leather soles shuffling across the gritty tiles of the floor. The safety, I thought instinctively, fumbling with the gun, my thumb finding the little lever. I heard the person reach the third-floor landing and stop, then continue cautiously forward. A hand brushed the open door, and it swung inward, its hinges sighing.
    It wasn’t warm in the apartment; December reached Tangier with an almost autumnal chill, and the temperature inside the building was the same as the temperature outside, but I was sweating. You can do this, I told myself, pressing my back to the wall, steadying my breath. There was no doubt in my mind I had fired the gun before. Just like riding a bike, Dr. Delpay had said, and he’d been right. Skills had come back to me, and so would this, just like the delicate and miraculously unforgettable feat of balancing on two narrow tires.
    The intruder stepped into the hallway, moving so quietly that my knowledge of his presence was almost purely intuition. No doubt he saw what I had seen by now, the