Crimetime Read online

  In Maria Fres-Felix’s city, life is hard, unidentified corpses are found with alarming regularity, and “pearls are tears.” But its most concerned citizen, SJ Tuason, makes for a charismatic inspector, and many of the city’s victims—an ex-pyramid scam artist, a Queen Amidala cosplayer, and a young matinee idol, to name a few—are as unforgettable as the human landscape she explores. Crimetime is breathtaking urban fear and fun, and we are all captive citizens.”

  Angelo R. Lacuesta

  Editor-at-Large, Esquire Philippines

  Winner of several National Book Awards

  Maria L.M. Fres-Felix’s Crimetime is everything a crime thriller should be: fast-paced, baffling, enigmatic. Yet she offers more by way of mystery using time-tested techniques in storytelling. The language is austere, clear-cut, yet no less admirable in that it grabs the reader by the hair and drags the same right into the very thick and center of a secret that is slowly unfolding. Even at the very start, the reader has no choice but to consent to being a live audience. She is definitely at home with the literary noir genre.

  Joel Pablo Salud

  Editor-in-Chief, Philippines Graphic

  and author of The Distance of Rhymes

  and Other Tragedies

  A chocoholic, kickboxing, woodcarving, head turner; homicide detective SJ Tuazon is as tough as they come. Fres-Felix’s heroine breaks bones as much as gender barriers as she navigates thru the horrific traffic and crime infested back alleys of the city—Kyusi—she calls home. Here, crime is a way of life and life hangs by a thread.

  Charlson Ong

  Author of Blue Angel White Shadow

  Winner, Centennial Prize and

  S.E.A. Write Award.

  It’s high time that crime-fic be put at center stage of Philippine letters. Here, a compendium of well-written Sherlock Holmesque stories, set at our bustling Metro where milieu and characters extol authenticity, is a fine example of where we should commence in this rarely trod sub-genre of fiction. This book is a pleasure to read. Or, if I may ask Fres-Felix, as verbalized by Police Inspector S. J. Tuazon, “And you’re telling us all of this only now?” Really, why only now? The pleasure could have been read way earlier.

  Joselito D. Delos Reyes

  National Book Award-winning author

  of iSTATUS NATION

  Crimetime: Inspector SJ Tuason Case Files

  Copyright to this digital edition © 2017 by Maria L.M. Fres-Felix and Anvil Publishing, Inc.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Published and exclusively distributed by

  ANVIL PUBLISHING, INC.

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  125 Pioneer Street, Mandaluyong City

  1550 Philippines

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  www.anvilpublishing.com

  Book design by: Jordan Santos (cover) and Miguel Cabreros (interior)

  E-book formatting by Arvyn Cerezo

  ISBN 9786214201938 (e-book)

  Version 1.0.0

  To my mother, Josefa M. Fres

  CONTENTS

  PREFACE

  FOREWORD

  PHOTOBOMBER

  SCAR WARS

  BRUISED

  A DEATH IN LOOBAN

  PREFACE

  Georges Simenon and Agatha Christie—move over a bit. An enterprising clutch of young Filipino writers are encroaching on your turf. They are attempting to write crime fiction in the hope that they are venturing into terra incognita and hopefully make a pile as well the way you masters of who dun it have done it. Now comes Maria L. M. Fres-Felix with her Crimetime story collection, actually linked short stories. The chase starts with a murder at the Quezon Memorial Circle. The prose of Ms. Felix is tight, her plotting linear--a search for the criminal that is at the same time a commentary on our convoluted justice system. Her eye for detail is keen and exacting and her terse dialogue also portrays character and pushes the plot to its conclusion. Crime fiction is a genre that has a wide following in the West but a small audience in this country for most Filipinos still want more of the short romantic fictions that lift them from dreary ordinary living. If Filipinos start reading Ms. Felix’s crime story and those other efforts in this genre, then our literature will acquire wider breadth and hopefully more readers as well.

  F. Sionil Jose

  National Artist

  FOREWORD

  There are at least three good reasons why you should read this book—and hopefully many more like it:

  1. We Filipinos don’t write enough fiction about crime;

  2. We don’t write enough crime fiction that feature the police as heroes; and

  3. In fiction as in real life, we find very few heroic law enforcers who also happen to be women.

  Dada Fres-Felix’s Crimetime addresses all three deficiencies, which in themselves reveal some interesting and disturbing truths about our society and the way we see and present ourselves.

  Going by the tabloid headlines, there’s clearly no shortage of material for crime writers in the Philippines. In 2014—before the new Duterte administration’s bloody “war on drugs” dramatically skewed the figures for both drug use and killings judicial and otherwise—there were over 1.1 million crimes reported in the country, with index crimes (murder, rape, robbery, carnapping, etc.) accounting for nearly half of them; population-wise, the crime rate stood at 1 in a 100, according to Rappler.com.

  But contemporary Philippine fiction hardly reflects this reality. There’s a lot of political violence, for sure, as there has been since Rizal’s time—lands are stolen, workers and peasants exploited, activists abducted and tortured, corrupt politicians assassinated—but people don’t seem to get killed out of sheer rage, greed, jealousy, fear, and the other baser instincts that make us fallibly human. I’ve also often remarked on another notable and perplexing absence from our literature—our irrepressible humor, which otherwise infects everything we do and say. It will take another paper to plumb the reasons for these egregious omissions, but I’ll advance the hypothesis that Rizal’s novels set the template for high seriousness—indeed solemnity—in the way we approach our fiction, especially the novel. To put it another way, politics seems ever worthy a subject, but crime too common to bother with.

  Neither do Pinoy cops and gumshoes figure as heroes in popular fiction (although they do now, on TV, especially in these Dutertean times). The reason here should be more obvious, in the deep mistrust with which our law enforcers are held by the public, the sad legacy of decades of perceived corruption and abuse. (I say “sad” as the son of a onetime Manila patrolman.) In American pop culture, heroic cops take on the system—rugged individuals driven to prove themselves right against all odds. In the Filipino sphere, heroes are inextricably bound to the community, and in the very least the family—savior figures who effectively assume the burden of the nation. It’s a tough match to make with the typical caricature of the pot-bellied parak shaking down a motorist for his lunch, and the reported crime solution efficiency of about 30% over the past few years hardly inspires adulation. Many years ago, in an essay for an American literary journal devoted to the theme of “Crime and Punishment,” I remarked that “In the Philippines, we have crimes and punishmen
ts aplenty, but they have very little to do with each other.” In a society marked by dysfunctional justice, we clearly need more than a few good men (and women) in uniform.

  And how many Filipino policewomen have figured in our fictional fantasies? To my recollection, zero—although we should acknowledge the progress of women officers in the Philippine National Police and the growing utility of Women’s Desks. It can’t be too difficult to imagine that many of these female officers have faced as many aggravations within their precincts as they have on the streets.

  For all these reasons, Dada Fres-Felix’s chocoholic, Bon Jovi-loving SJ Tuason is a signal contribution not just to Philippine fiction, but to our imagination of our better Filipino selves in a perniciously hostile universe. She is sympathetically drawn—with the hard edge you might expect of a gal in a tough world, but also vulnerable in ways you don’t expect (and here I’m tempted to put in a spoiler alert but I won’t).

  In a seminal essay on crime fiction written more than half a century ago, Raymond Chandler defined his expectations of the detective as hero—almost inevitably, in those pre-feminist days, a “he”:

  “He is the hero, he is everything. He must be a complete man and a common man and yet an unusual man. He must be, to use a rather weathered phrase, a man of honor, by instinct, by inevitability, without thought of it, and certainly without saying it. He must be the best man in his world and a good enough man for any world. I do not care much about his private life; he is neither a eunuch nor a satyr; I think he might seduce a duchess and I am quite sure he would not spoil a virgin; if he is a man of honor in one thing, he is that in all things. He is a relatively poor man, or he would not be a detective at all. He is a common man or he could not go among common people. He has a sense of character, or he would not know his job. He will take no man’s money dishonestly and no man’s insolence without a due and dispassionate revenge. He is a lonely man and his pride is that you will treat him as a proud man or be very sorry you ever saw him. He talks as the man of his age talks, that is, with rude wit, a lively sense of the grotesque, a disgust for sham, and a contempt for pettiness. The story is his adventure in search of a hidden truth, and it would be no adventure if it did not happen to a man fit for adventure. He has a range of awareness that startles you, but it belongs to him by right, because it belongs to the world he lives in.”

  That’s basically all that Inspector Tuason has been made out to be—and more, if you factor in a penchant for carving elephants. These four finely crafted stories—which often contrast pop glitter with pedestrian grime—will almost certainly achieve their purpose, a truly noble one in these days of crass entertainment, which is to amuse us by teasing the mind, in our search of the answer to that most basic of human puzzles, for which I suspect the crime story was invented: “Why do we do what we do?”

  Jose Dalisay Jr.

  Quezon City

  1 November 2016

  PHOTOBOMBER

  The last sound that the man heard before he died was zumba music pulsating from a boom box. It came from a tree-shaded area a few meters away, where a group of matrons stomped and grunted to the Latin beat, some of them missing a step or two.

  As the man fell sideways on the stone bench, the sun sliced through Quezon Memorial Circle, glinting off the metal object protruding from his side, coaxing sweat from children racing in bicycles and joggers running laps. It was a relatively haze-free Saturday morning and the three angels atop the marble pylons that marked ex-President Quezon’s final resting place seemed less mournful than usual. No one paid any special attention to the man on the stone bench. He looked like someone just taking a nap.

  Amid the sounds of laughter and joyful shrieks from the early morning activities that the man could no longer hear, taho and squid ball vendors were doing brisk business. When the zumba session ended, the ladies spread out, chugging water from plastic jugs, and wiping sweat from flushed faces. A woman took selfies, completely enamored by her new green shirt with the zumba logo under which jiggled flabby stomach that months of zumba could not conquer. She had been taking selfies even before the start of the session, preening and making duck faces.

  “Come on, groupfie,” she hollered. Her companions huddled next to her. Click.

  “Closer.” They squeezed their sweaty bodies together, while still making sure that their faces were at their best angles. Click.

  “Now wacky!” They stuck out their tongues, or crossed their eyes, or simply spread out their arms, like geriatric loonies. Click.

  “See, we all look beautiful,” she cooed, reviewing the shots. But the next instant, she frowned. “Ugh. Photobombers,” she said, glaring at one of the pre-session shots showing what seemed like two men seated on the bench a short distance behind her.

  She was about to delete the picture, but decided against it. She looked radiant in that shot. As they walked to their cars, she noticed one of the photobombers still on the bench, this time asleep. She glared at him, only to notice a blood stain on the bench.

  “Eeek! The photobomber. He’s bleeding!”

  Her companions ran to her side.

  “Oh God, is he dead?”

  They took tentative steps closer to the man. Their eyes widened at the sight of a small icepick stuck on his left side.

  “Dear Lord, it’s no longer safe here in the Circle!” A lady in pink made the sign of the cross. “He’s been stabbed, and in broad daylight!”

  “Good God, a dead man. You think he’s ‘gonna haunt the place?”

  “Don’t worry, beh. Quezon is buried right at the monument, and there’s been no haunting.”

  One of them had the presence of mind to call the police.

  Blood tinged the left side of the body lying on the park bench. Inspector SJ Tuason checked for a pulse and found none. She tilted her head and frowned. The icepick could not have nicked the carotid artery, not the way it was angled, she thought. He would have had enough time to call for help before he bled out and died. But he obviously hadn’t, which suggested that he died instantly. Which in turn suggested that the icepick was poisoned. She straightened up, looking taller than 5’7” in her neatly tucked blue uniform and black leather boots. Her hair was severely pulled back from her face and twisted in a bun that emphasized her turned-out ears the shape of baby clams. Her mother told her that she was pinaglihi sa halaan. She swept the scene with her gray green eyes, a rare color in someone as dark as cinnamon. Then she puffed her cheeks and exhaled. Who would be desperate enough to kill in such a crowded place?

  The Scene Of the Crime Operatives in their black shirts with “SOCO” inscribed in yellow, were busy collecting crime scene evidence. First responders had just cordoned off the area. They were now shooing away gawkers. These usiseros or usis usually hung around crime scenes as though they were watching a reality show and wanted to be part of it. Controlling the crowd on a Saturday was difficult. Quezon Memorial Circle was the weekend playground of those who were not rich or famous, a definite majority in the city. And now that almost everybody and his uncle owned a camera phone, crowd control was even more difficult. The first responders threatened to confiscate those cellphones.

  Tuason’s partner, Police Officer 2 Joshua Rios hurried to her side, plastic cup in hand. “Victim is Henry Campos-Villa. The wallet is intact.”

  “Campos-Villa the scammer?”

  “Hmmm,” Joshua squinted. “Maybe that’s why the name was vaguely familiar. I’ll check. If he’s the scammer, there’ll be a lot of people with motive. Anyway, I’ve canvassed the area. Nobody had seen anything suspicious.” He shook his head and handed her the plastic cup of taho topped with brown sugar syrup and sago. She nodded her thanks. He continued, “I guess with this many people and with the different activities going on . . . do you know there was a mass earlier? And there were several zumba classes going on simultaneously, it’s really hard to tell.”

  As she tipped the cup of taho, he went on. “The taho vendor said he saw a tall wiry man in a black T-sh
irt with the victim. The squidball man said he saw a short fat man in blue with the victim.” Joshua shook his head. Then he pointed with his lips at the zumba ladies. “Those, I reserved for you.”

  She tossed the cup into a trashcan in a fluid motion. “What’s the matter, not sexy enough for you?”

  Joshua had no time to reply as Tuason was well on her way striding on long legs to the group of matrons.

  “Typical Tuason, not waiting for a reply,” he murmured, shaking his head once more. At 23, he cut a handsome figure in his police hat and uniform that hinted at a well-sculpted body. He always wore his police hat to hide the thinning hair that made him look ten years older.

  Tuason sized up the group. The selfie-obsessed zumba lady seemed to be their leader.

  Tuason approached her.

  The zumba lady was reciting her litany of woes. When she saw Tuason, she said, “This is terrible. I have a dead man in my pictures.” She showed Tuason her cellphone.

  “Did you notice anything else, Ma’am? An argument, a fight?”

  She shook her head. “I didn’t even know they were there. Oh dear, bad luck. This is bad luck,” she kept muttering, while her friends shook their heads in sympathy. “And please, call me Charlene.” She forced a smile. “And you are…”

  “Inspector Tuason of Station 13.” She preferred to be addressed by her surname. “What time did you take those pictures, Charlene?”

  “A little before seven.”

  Tuason asked Charlene to email her the pictures. Then she took their contact details. She checked her cellphone. Satisfied that she had received the pictures, she gave them her calling card and requested them to get in touch if they thought of anything else. Then she let them go.