Ditched

An elderly couple was driving their Buick on a country road in Georgia to Florida after a great Labor Day weekend at their kids'. It was early in the morning and they enjoyed their ride with no cars on the road, just the calm and beautiful late summer scenery with occasional farms.

Suddenly, the wife exclaimed, "Oh my God, is that a body?"

"Where?" the husband followed her gaze to the right side of the road.

"We just passed it, back up!" the wife said.

The husband did back up and stopped the car. They both got out, keeping their distance from the body at the edge of the woods.

"Looks like a young woman," the wife said, staring intensely at a slim hardly clad body with dirty blond hair, positioned face down in the mud, with arms and legs sticking out in unnaturally deformed ways. It was some distance away from the road, difficult for the two of them to make out the details with their failing eyes.

"I'll go check if she is alive," the husband volunteered.

"Stop! What if it's a crime scene and you'll mess it up?" the woman said. She clearly watched too much Law & Order: SVU.

"What do you want me to do then?" the husband asked.

"Let's just call the police and wait for them here," the wife suggested.

"And what if she dies while we wait?"

"She hasn't moved an inch. Look at those stiff limbs!" the wife observed. "If anything, she is long dead. Call the cops!"

So the husband did. Waiting for the police to arrive, they were nervously pacing around the car, still debating if they should go to check the body.

The police arrived about seven long minutes after the call, blazing siren and lights. They stopped behind the Buick, the two officers got out and asked the couple where the body was. They headed there directly, telling the couple to stay near the car.

A minute later, both of them came back, hardly keeping themselves from laughing. One was trying to keep a serious face while calling for a back-up on his lapel mic.

"What's so funny, officer?" the perceptive wife asked.

"Nothing serious, ma'am, it's just a discarded sex doll. We are calling for 'back up' so that other officers could see it with their own eyes. No one will believe us if we just bring her in," the officer explained respectfully.

"But you are going to remove this filth off the road, right?" the disgusted wife asked indignantly.

"Absolutely, ma'am, rest assured we don't want other reports of a dead body coming in. You may proceed on your way, and thank you for being so careful and vigilant," the officer said.

When the Buick was driving off, they saw two more police cars driving to the "crime scene."

"And that's where our taxpayer money goes to!" the wife said angrily.

"C'mon, honey, give the boys a break. It must be a slow day for them, after a holiday. Let them have some fun! Can you imagine, a sex doll!" the husband said and chuckled.

***

The same evening, Brad Smith was sitting at home, having dinner after a long day on his family farm. He was alone as his wife Emily, a township police officer, was called in for a case. Eating in front of the TV, he saw the following report on the local evening news show:

"Early this morning, the police were called to the 37th mile marker on Georgia state route 441 to investigate a potential murder. A Florida couple traveling home after the Labor Day weekend reported a young woman's body ditched some distance off the side of the road. To the police officers' great surprise, the body turned out to be a discarded adult play doll."

Brad nearly chocked on his food. He didn't need to see the blurred footage of Serena to recognize her. He knew what he'd done. When he drove out to the edge of next town 30 miles away last night, he wanted to dig a whole and "bury" his beloved Serena in it. But then he thought he heard someone in the woods. Spooked, he just left her behind, jumped into his truck, and drove back home.

Still, seeing her made Brad's heart race and his cheeks blush. The male-female anchor duo was lightheartedly reporting additional details about the police officers' discovery, calling his Serena "someone's ex-girlfriend" and "adult companion" not to offend the prudish local viewers. They found it particularly amusing that she had socks on, and the male reporter broke into laughter mentioning it.

"Well, at least our police officers had something to amuse themselves with, clearing the crime scene," the female anchor wrapped up, trying to keep her face straight.

Meanwhile, Brad's frantic thoughts were "Will they be able to trace it back to me??? What if they do a DNA test or something? I can't even imagine what Emily would think if she finds out!"

To be continued...