I had picked a lock once before – Successfully! Leading up to that day, I had read all about locks and how they function. I had even dissected a few in order to ensure that my knowledge of them was sound. But years had passed since then.

My hands were not practiced. Their movements were not precise. I could see the errors in the motions that my muscles were able to produce. There is nothing so frustrating as perceiving a flaw in oneself, but not being able to correct it.

Five minutes into my attempt, Jerry appeared at the top of the stairs and made his way down to the first floor hall way. His patchy hair was mussed and wild, but I knew from experience that this did not necessarily indicate his sleep had been fitful. He placed a heavy hand upon my shoulder, indicating wordlessly for me to move. As I stood, my eyes noticed two tiny crumbs in the carpet, standing out almost as if they were glowing softly. Perhaps I was still tired and my eyes were still fuzzy. I gave my head a quick shake in hopes that its full clarity might return.

I remember watching Jerry curl his fingers around the knob before giving it what looked to be a gentle tug. The motions were smooth, and the muscles under his skin barely flexed. It always amazed me, watching him work – it was as if his very touch (and not the force that he had applied) was what caused to door knob to come apart. There was a thump from the inside of the room as the other end of the handle fell to the floor.

Impossibilia had been right – the smell was apparent once the door had been pushed open. It was not so strong as to be overwhelming, but the message of death that it carried came through all too loud and clear. As if by instinct, we all covered our mouths and noses – except for Jerry who, as was typical, seemed unfazed and indifferent toward the ordeal.

We found Mr. Purvis’s body sprawled out upon his bedroom floor amongst his uneven piles of hoarded possessions, a puddle of rancid vomit at his side. His skin had turned sickly and dull, and grew darker in a gradient the closer it came to the floor – evidence of the blood pooling within his flesh. His abdomen was bloated and round; his face eerily relaxed, as if his features were trying to slouch away from the very bones that supported them. I heard Henrietta make a guttural choking sound and saw her turn away out of the corner of my eye. I had half expected this to be followed by the sound of the contents of her stomach splashing down upon the wood floor, but this was thankfully not what transpired.

“I think he’s dead,” Jerry stated, and we turned to look at him, unsure of how serious he had truly meant for his understatement to be.

“But what could’a killed ‘im?” Impossibilia asked, not daring to go closer, but still eyeing the body with a morbid curiosity.

There was a plate of cookies on his bed, stale from having been left out for two days. Like the crumbs in the hallway, I perceived them to be emanating a soft and self-assured glow – the difference was that this time, I recognized what the glow meant. At the time, I didn’t say a word to my companions for fear that this new-found understanding might slip somehow from my grasp, but as I stood there and stared at that plate and the baked goods that were piled upon it, I knew with an eighty-eight percent certainty that it was the cookies that had killed Mr. Purvis.

My dream had been a prophetic one. My eyes had become able to see probability.