Free The Creeping by Alexandra Sirowy

Cause of death is trauma to the head. Medical experts estimate Jane Doe to be between five and six years old. Please be advised that the picture we are about to show is of a graphic nature, but in an effort to identify this little girl, we have decided to broadcast it.” The feed to the blonde is cut, leaving only a photograph taken by the coroner.
    The girl’s eyes are closed and her skin is pale. She lies on a sterile stainless-steel table, her body covered by a papery blue sheet. Her hair is damp, arranged so it covers the wound that severed her scalp from her head, but the red locks are unmistakable. She looks exactly like Jeanie. I jump to my feet but only have time to reach the kitchen before I retch my two bites of breakfast into the sink.

Chapter Five
    I ’m clean and dressed a minute before Detective Shane pounds on our front door. I used up all the house’s hot water cowering on the slick tile floor of the shower, trying to flush the similarities between Jeanie and Jane Doe from my mind. Coincidence . I say it over and over, hoping to drum it into the universe, hoping to make it true.
    â€œMorning, Stella,” Shane says as I swing the front door open wide and step back for him. “Your dad said he’d be at work this morning. He already take off?”
    â€œA little while ago.”
    He follows me to the living room, where I curl in the corner of our large floral couch. It’s one Mom bought the year she left. She used to say the flowers looked like birds that were trying to escape through the window. I thought that sounded like a fairy tale at the time. Now I think I should have taken the hint. She was looking for her own escape from us. I keep meaning to make Dad replace it, but he never has time to shop for a new one.
    â€œHow you doing this morning? Sleep any?” he asks, folding his long limbs into Dad’s leather recliner.
    I ignore his questions. “Why isn’t Detective Rhino Berry here?” I’ve called Detective Frank Berry “Rhino” since I was seven. I was going through a major Serengeti phase when they came to question me that September. All I wanted to talk about were safari animals. Berry told me to call him Rhino from then on. Shane drops his gaze to his boots, cemetery mud still caked on their soles. “Where is Frank?” I repeat, stiffening on the couch.
    â€œUgh.” He rakes his hands through his thinning hair. “He had a heart attack two months ago. Then another three weeks back.” He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “It finished him off, kid.” My stomach plummets again, but I know I won’t vomit. Nothing’s left in there.
    â€œBut he was only fiftysomething,” I whisper. “Not much older than my dad.”
    Shane heaves a sigh and pats his shirt pocket absentmindedly. I can make out the shape of a pack of cigarettes. “This job . . .” He trails off.
    â€œUnsolved cases,” I supply. I’ve grown up watching the strain of a cold case on these two men, seen the years round their shoulders forward, the stress coat their hair in white like a fine dusting of snow.
    â€œBut enough of that and back to business.” Shane straightens up, puffs his chest out. “I’m lead detective on the Jane Doe case for obvious reasons, so let’s get down to brass tacks.” Shane speaks with a drawl that elongates his vowels and makes waste of consonants. Hegot the accent growing up in a big city in the south. I told him once that he’s crazy to live in Savage over a place with sun year round. He didn’t deny it. He just said that moving to be a cop in Savage, where his dad’s side lived for four generations, seemed like an adventure at the time. I don’t like to think about why Shane stays. I don’t want to think that it’s unfinished business like Jeanie’s unsolved case that he can’t walk away from.
    He draws a notepad