‘23½ Lies’ Chapters 1 & 2

Photo Collage: MOA Staff; (Illustrated Portrait: Michael Hoeweller; (Source: David Burnett); Book: Hachette Book Group, Inc.) Facebook Twitter LinkedIn

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OVER THE LAST three months, the SFPD homicide squad had been swamped by nightmarish murders of all types. Robbery-homicides, murder-suicides, and a kidnapping where the victim was locked in

a car trunk and the drugged-up abductor, the victim’s nephew, turned himself in. But he had no idea where he’d parked the car. The car was found, but too late for Uncle Dave.

I punched out of work at six on Friday and drove home to my family. Mercifully, the horrible week had been overwritten by a weekend of eat, play, love, and sleep.

Now, it was Monday morning.

My closet was the most organized part of my life. I opened the doors, ran my eyes across the neat row of blue trousers, button-down shirts in white, beige, pink, and blue-striped and at the

end of the rod, five blue gabardine blazers hung in dry cleaner’s plastic bags. It was very satisfying to just grab and go.

I was dressing, listening to my husband, Joe, and our daughter, Julie, laughing in the large, open, loft-type room outside the bedroom door. I was also thinking of breakfast — a big bowl of

granola, say, with strawberries — when I heard a loud crash followed by my daughter’s shrill screams and the barking of our elderly dog, Martha.

What the hell?

I cleared our bedroom in a second and, once inside the main room, focused on the chaos in the kitchen. Julie Ann Molinari, our nearly five-year-old, had her hands to her cheeks, eyes to the

floor, screaming, screaming, taking a breath and screaming some more. Joe was admonishing our border collie.

“No, Martha, no. Stop that. Now.”

As Joe made a grab for Martha’s collar, Julie wailed, “Noooo, noooo, nooooo! Mommeeee, hellpppp!”

I hurried into the eye of the storm, shouting, “What’s happening, what?”

“Lindsay, don’t come over here in your bare feet.”

I braked and saw what had gone wrong. A glass globe that had held water, gravel, and two orange goldfish had somehow sailed from its place on the kitchen counter, dropped to the floor, and

shattered. Mr. Bubbles and Fanny flopped among the shards and colored bits of fishbowl decor.

“They’re going to be fine,” I said to my daughter. “Don’t worry, but we have to work fast. Joe, can you take Julie?”

“You bet. Lift your arms, Bug. Hang on to me.”

There was a pitcher of distilled water near the sink that I used to top up the fishbowl. I picked up each of the flip-floppers by the tail, slipped them into the pitcher, and dropped in the

aerator. Joe tossed a towel onto the floor and said, “Good job, Blondie. I’ll take it from here.”