339 Natural Causes

"People we know, people we won't miss, people who just get in our way," explained Rick "Rick-o-chet" O'Shea, "die all the time."

"What about dying all the time before their time?" pressed the detective.

"Everyone dies. You're smart. You took algebra or something, right? Lookit, it's a bell curve. Most folks die under the highest part. Some folks even live way longer than average, at the way end of the curve."

"The outliers."

"Well, no better way to be at the other way end—if you catch my drift—than by being out there, lyin'."

"It's Gaussian, then, you're saying?"

"Don't put words in my mouth, punk. It's a bell curve, like I said."

"And how's the curve by cause of death?"

"Waddaya talkin' about? Everyone dies of heart failure. The heart fails—you die. Gonna happen to me and gonna happen to you. You'll see."

"And under that end of the curve that guys manage yourselves?"

"Hey—whaddaya sayin'?"

"It's just well established that a lot of those who died under the very young,—or young-er end—seem to have died suspiciously."

"Not at all. All of them died of heart failure. Like the rest of us. Nothing suspicious there."

"Again, let's look at that end of the curve."

"Sure."

"Ice pick into the neck," the detective read, consulting his notes.

"Fall on an icepick and ya bleed. You lose too much blood and your heart fails. Heart failure. You die."

"Multiple gunshot wounds to the torso?"

"Ya know how many bullets fly around God's green Earth every day? If a heart gets shot up, it fails. Heart failure."

"Eviscerated, hanging from a grappling hook in cold storage?"

"The heart ain't the only thing that fails. If there ain't no organs to perfuse, the heart fails. Everyone knows that. Heart failure. Natural causes."

"You're saying all of your rivals died of natural causes?" He shows him a coroner's report.

"Looky right there, line 39 at the bottom," he fingered, now visibly angry. 'Cardiorespiratory arrest'. Natural causes!"

"Yes, but line 40, 'Secondary to', further reads–"

The interview was over.

"Cardiorespiratory arrest," wrote the coroner, putting it down on line #39. She began to write something on line #40 but scratched it out.

________________

AUTHOR'S NOTES:

For Wednesday, December 4, Day 339 of the 2024 Story-a-Day Challenge.

366 WORDS (without A/N)

27 DAYS TO GO! THE STORIES KEEP HOME-STRETCHIN' ON IN THIS VOCAL CHALLENGE, 366 WORDS A DAY.

There are currently three Vocal writers in this 2024 Story-a-Day Challenge:

• L.C. (Smart-ass) Schäfer

• Rachel (Bad-ass) Deeming

• Gerard (Lazy-ass) DiLeo