Justice Served, fiction by Vinnie Hansen
R ay Ray’s feet swept onto South Mission Beach without the rest of him. “ He had huge feet,” his sister Samantha said. She perched on the metal chair in front of my desk, her hands stretched apart. “All the rubber in the soles of his shoes made his feet buoyant.” She scooped up blond hair and draped it over her shoulder to hide a teal strap that didn’t look like it could support a fishing lure. “ Police tell ya that?” She toyed with my desk plaque: Serving Justice Since 1966. “ Maybe a great white got the rest of him,” I said. “ Ray Ray wasn’t a surfer.” Samantha inspected her split ends. “He was a peanut vendor at SeaWorld.” “ There you go. Didn’t the original Shamu nearly bite off a trainer’s leg?” To my way of thinking, a satisfying story. People who caged up animals deserved what they got. I reached for my Marlboros parked by a glass ashtray. “ Shamu’s an orca; great whites are sharks.” “ Right,” I said, squinting, “but orcas are killer whales , right?” ...
