“IT MUST be tough to die in drowning,” Rochelle’s autopsy assistant, Jessie, commented as she removed the chest plate gently, careful not to bump with any tissue around the victim’s chest.
Rochelle sighed when she confirmed the cause of death by just seeing the heart’s situation. “Drowning is the most painful way of dying,” she said. “You can feel your lungs being filled with water, making it hard for you to breathe. You’ll die slowly and painfully.”
Jessie shivered as if scared of what she said. “I’d rather hanged myself—”
“Yeah, and make our jobs easier,” Rochelle cut off. “Sew this part, then clean the table.”
Jessie’s brows furrowed. “That’s it? Case closed?”
Rochelle arched a brow. “Are you in doubt? I can see it clearly. It’s murder.”
“Homicide.”
Rochelle and Jessie looked up and saw Thaddeus peeking over their heads. He was towering them with his six feet and three-inches height—A height that could have been the center of a basketball team if he didn’t take pathology and law in college.
“The killer waited for the victim to come home at eight p.m, and then invited her to have a quick swim. After some drinks, he made a fake argument with her and intentionally pushed her to the pool. When he saw that she was about to rise from the water, he jumped and strangled her until she got drowned,” Rochelle explained in her deadly tone that she often used in court trials.
Thaddeus smirked. Rochelle can see his annoying smile behind his surgical mask. “That’s what we saw on the CCTV. And, it was a clear case of homicide, Roch.” He said and moved to the other side of the autopsy table. “Where did you get the idea that it’s murder?”
Rochelle arched her brow to her colleague. “Crime of passion, Dr. Martin,” she said as she removed her latex gloves. “The killer was the victim’s boyfriend. Before meeting him at her house, the victim was with her other man. When she went home, the killer was already in her house. I’ve talked with the killer; he did it because he saw in the CCTV footages that her girlfriend was always with somebody during weekends.”
Thaddeus’ brows raised. “Why I felt these chills every time you’re calling me ‘Dr. Martin’?”
Jessie, the mortuary tech, snorted. “Everybody does, doc.”
Rochelle rolled her eyes ceilingwards. “This is not your post, Thaddeus. Get the fuck out of here.”
“Wait, don’t be mad at me, Roch.” Thaddeus pulled down his surgical mask. “I just want to ask if you’re also in charge of the Condo post?”
“Do you think I’m buying that reason of yours?” Rochelle took off her mask and was about to go to the changing room when Thaddeus called her again.
“Give her to me,” he shouted. “I don’t want to perform the floater’s post—”
Rochelle looked over her shoulders. “Then quit your job.”
Rochelle Ocampo is one of the skilled medical examiners of the Bulacan Coroner’s Office. She was a fresh graduate of law and was about to get her physician’s license when the City Coroner sent her an invitation letter to join the Academy class. The Chief Medical Examiner was the program’s current speaker.
At first, the deputy wasn’t convinced that she wanted to be a medical examiner. She was so young back then, a twenty-five-year-old fresh graduate of law—but often mistaken tourism graduate. With her five-foot and five-inch height and slim body, she was always the campus’s first choice to be the reigning Miss University—that she often refused because she’s not into crowds and publicities. Rochelle usually spends her spare time in her house, mulling over the backlogs from her thesis.
Since the death of her Aunt Amanda, she chose to live alone. Her Aunt left her all their family’s properties in Bulacan and some investments. But, Rochelle distributed them to their housekeepers that did their job until her Aunt’s last breath. They never leave her Aunt’s side during those times. Unlike the man her Aunt chose to pour all her love, her dad did it to her mom. She heaved a sigh. They’re all the same.
It’s been eleven years since her Aunt’s death and nineteen years since her mom’s. They both died because of loving a man who betrayed them, left them, and forgot them.
“I’m starting to get jealous of those dead bodies in the compartment,” Thaddeus commented when Rochelle found him in the corpse storage. “You’re paying them a visit from time to time.”
Rochelle passed by him when he tried to meet her. “Those cadavers are my life, you know.”
“How sweet,” he said. “Did the papers of the floater made you change your mind?”
“Let me see the body first,” Rochelle said, pulling open the steel door of compartment 104.
“Wait!” Thaddeus pushed back the door. “It’s not safe for our nostrils to open the compartment.”
Rochelle knotted her forehead. “Odors are important—”
“Yeah, I know. But the right place for that is inside the autopsy suite,” Thaddeus said hastily. His gloved hand remained on the compartment’s door. “It might affect the cooled air here.”
Rochelle arched her brow. “Really?”
Rochelle knew that Thaddeus was just baffling. She’s been working with this team of medical examiners for four years. She has learned the personalities of every one of them. This big guy hates the odors of decomposing bodies.
“It might spread bacteria in the air that can cause airborne diseases—”
“Then, this case is perfect for you. You specialized in internal medicines, right?” Rochelle said and moved away from the compartment. “I’ll stick with the woman that jumped from the thirty-sixth floor of her condo.”
Thaddeus groaned. “Roch, please give me a break—”
“I need a break, too.”
“Then come with me tonight,” Thaddeus said suddenly.
Her brows furrowed. “Is that your way of asking a date? How lame.”
“Don’t assume,” Thaddeus said with a chuckle. “Marielle, Janus, and Detective Albert will join us.”
“And, all of you will persuade me to trade my post with your floater,” she said and crossed her arms. “I know better—”
“No, it’s not like that, Roch. It’s my dad’s death anniversary today,” he said in a low voice. “I just want to reminisce about his lost with my friends.”
Rochelle’s brows raised. She turned her back and held the door handle. “Okay, just send me the details.”
She opened the door and walked out of the room. She heard Thaddeus called her, begging to trade posts with her, but she ignored him.
***