Bea stood in the mail room with her hands on her hips. It seemed like each time she solved a problem, a new one cropped up. Just last night she had managed to get the window above her kitchen sink to close. She had been thrilled, the cold had been becoming a problem. She thought back to the victory dance she had done, now looking at the piles of mail in the mail room she wondered if the frog had been right. He had said the dance was too much, over the top, not appropriate given the recent events in St. Abel. It was a remarkably rude frog, Bea thought, maybe I should give it a name so I have something more specific to direct my anger at than, 'The Frog'.

Bea picked up a package from on top of the nearest bin. The package was for Jackie Redford, but the return address was blacked out, all Bea could make out was 'Ackeri'. Maybe it was the street name, possibly Ackeridge, no way to know for sure. From then on Bea called the frog Ackeridge.

Looking around at the rest of the mail Bea thought it looked like an infestation, there was never this much mail at the Foxberry. She decided to go ahead and run Jackie's package up to her in an attempt to feel like she'd gotten something done that day. She looked around quickly and figured it wouldn't hurt to grab the other packages that had been strewn about as well. She dropped the six packages into a rolling bin and headed for the service elevator. She dropped the packages off in no particular order, usually she would go all the way to the top floor that needed a package and work her way down. However, today she wasn't in any particular hurry to get back to the sorting that awaited her in the mailroom, and she enjoyed riding the service elevator.

She dropped the packages off as she pulled them out of the bin. Bret, Jackie, Billy Bob, Ren, Azula, Evelyn. She thought it was odd that they had all mentioned for her not to come into the apartment as the accepted their packages, she never came past the threshold on a delivery. Today though each package recipient had mentioned that they had gotten lice and didn't want Bea to catch any. Azula had mentioned that she'd gotten it a few days ago, and it probably wasn't an issue anymore, but had warned her just to be safe Which was nice of them, but how odd that all of the people who had received packages also had lice?

        Bea sat back. She had been through Evans' mail at least three times and couldn't find anything straightforward about how he may have died. Everything from his 'Old Friend' was cryptic, or outright absurd. He spent so much time talking about all of the antique knives he had collected, and not only in one letter. Almost every letter had a mention of a new knife 'Old Friend' had acquired.

Bea sighed exasperatedly. Then it hit her. The cutlery museum. She leapt up, grabbed her coat, and was out the door in a flash with the most recent letter still clutched in her hand. She ran so quickly down the street that she barely had time to realize how there seemed to be fewer frogs about than usual before she was throwing open the museum door. 

Once inside the museum, Bea made her way directly to the knives. For the first time since racing out the door, Bea realized how unprepared she was to go searching for murder evidence in a cutlery museum. Even if she did find something, how could she tell the police when opening the mail in the first place was illegal? She took another deep breath and shook out the letter she had brought with her. The first knife mentioned was a simple one, so old it was brown with age and didn't have any sort of fancy metal work. Bea found the knife quickly, but there was nothing about it that seemed special or out of the ordinary. the same went for two of the other knives mentioned in the letter. The last one though, an old carving Knife, was nowhere to be found. Bea bit the inside of her cheek, she had had a theory that the 'Old Friend' might work at the museum, but now she supposed that she may not have been finding the knives mentioned in the letter at all, just similar ones. She decided to make her way home and sleep on it.

Now that she wasn't in a hurry, the frogs became much more obvious. She picked her way home trying to ignore them, but when she got back to her apartment there was a frog right at her door. It turned to her with almost human like movements, and spoke. With the same voice as the voice inside her head.

Bea thanked the mailman and bid him happy holidays as she took the day's mail bin. Only three packages today. The lack of packages had been evident to Bea ever since end of October. She'd come from a big city, and had been expecting to have more packages than surfaces to put them on. instead she pulled the three packages from the bin and placed them under the counter so no one would get any ideas about stealing them.

'Protecting mail now?' said a voice in the back of her head, 'Not squirreling it away to open for ourselves?' The voice had arrived after the police had questioned her. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. The voice was stupid, opening the mail hadn't hurt anyone per se since its owner was dead. 

'Death!' the voice chirped, 'Death just follows you everywhere!'

'That was just mean,' Bea thought, 'it wasn't my fault Dad died, I wasn't home and they never even found his body, just his blood.'

'What about at college?'

'That girl died of an overdose.'

'But you handed her the cup'

'No she grabbed my cup, downed it in two gulps, and screeched away to the dance floor.'

'Whatever you have to tell yourself.' said the voice. Then it retreated to the back of Bea's mind and kept its mouth tightly closed.

Bea sighed, she didn't like the voice to begin with, but bringing up her dad had been a dirty move. Especially because it reminded her of what Evans' mail had said. The letter hadn't had a return address but had been signed 'An Old Friend'. The letter had talked about some other friends first, and then dove into how the Old Friend knew Evans had been in danger, saying there was a plot. Bea had hoped opening the letter might answer some questions, but it only answered one 'who is this from, there's no return address, and it hadn't really answered that one.

Mostly it raised new questions. How could this friend know Evans was going to die? Why did they need to Hide their identity, was it an identity Evans would know from 'Old Friend'? And most of all, if the letter had been warning Evans about his death, why had it arrived three weeks later? Snail mail wasn't that slow anymore.

At the end of the day, Bea bent down and looked at the little basket full of Evans' mail. In a split second decision she grabbed it and stuffed it in the inside pocket of her yellow rain jacket. The owner was dead, and the town needed answers.

Bea turned and gave her room a quick once over on her way out the door that morning. The apartment was supposed to be two rooms, a kitchen/living room and a bedroom, but somewhere in the long past of the Foxberry one of the bedroom walls had been ripped out. It was an odd effect, looking at the apartment from the door, it was as though someone had taken a cross section of the room to be viewed under a microscope. From the door, Bea could see the entirety of her kitchen and the entirety of her bedroom, which would be a single room if not for the remaining bedroom wall pressed up against the side of the refrigerator.

Bea shook herself, 'I shouldn't be thinking of people watching me under a microscope, not after Evans's passing' she thought and closed the door with a snap. She made her way downstairs and unlocked the mailroom door. She placed her coat and bag on the counter and looked around, not much work to be done, as the mailman mentioned yesterday he wouldn't be in until the afternoon. She sat down behind the counter and her stomach grumbled. Suddenly she remembered the two for one deal at the pizza parlors, she hadn't been in town for a two for one deal yet, though she had heard the legends. Nothing wrong with pizza for breakfast, though she could imagine what her mother would say. Her mother would stroke her dark hair and say something rude disguised as health nut propaganda. Bea shook herself for the second time that morning, 'There's a reason you didn't go home after graduating' she thought as she grabbed her bag and slipped her arms into her yellow raincoat

Bea passed through the park slowly. It was a gorgeous day and she felt silly in a raincoat, but it was warm and had been on top of the stack by the door. She gave a smile to Dorothy, who was playing chess with Mr. Jenkins. Dorothy tried to smile back but it ended up being more of a grimace and Bea chuckled to herself, Dorothy obviously wasn't there for the chess. Somehow Bea almost missed Elwood, who was sitting not far away, but she offered a grin and a wave to try and make up for it though he probably hadn't noticed. Then her stomach growled again, louder than it had in the mailroom, and she hurried off towards the smell of freshly baked pizza.

The day started with a bang.  Actually, it was two bangs, first the bang of the mailman's box on the counter, and then the bang of Bea hitting her head on the underside of that counter in surprise. Bea had taken it upon herself to try and fix the outlet under the counter in order to add a lamp to the room, not all of the overhead lights worked which made the Foxberry's mailroom a rather dreary place to work.

Bea placed her hand on the edge of the counter so as to avoid hitting her head again and stood up.

"Good morning Miss," said the mailman.

"Good Morning," Bea replied.

"It's really coming down out there, did you fix that leak in your kitchen?"

Bea sighed and brushed her bangs out of her eyes. One of the windows in her apartment was stuck in a half up position. So far it hadn't been an issue because it was still warm outside and it hadn't rained more than a drizzle in the months the window had been stuck. The night before Bea had finally gone to battle with the window after Old Man Jenkins had mentioned loudly that it looked like rain.

"No, but it's kinda right over the sink so I figured I'd worry about it later."

"You should ask the super to take a look at it sooner rather than later Miss."

Bea smiled wearily, she and the super had gotten into an argument in her first week at the building and he had refused to help her with anything since.

"I'll do that, Don't get too wet delivering the rest of the mail."

"Thank you miss, have a good day now." 

"You too."

Bea sorted through the mail, placing it into to the proper slot on the wall. Mcghee, Greene, Chance, Chi, Greene, Rose, Rose, Nelson, Lovett. She was shaken when she came across a piece of mail addressed to Mr. Evans. 

What should she do with mail for a man who had died? She supposed she could call the receptionist, who had been at the Foxberry much longer than Bea and had probably dealt with this sort of thing before. Unfortunately, the receptionist was on vacation and had warned all the other building employees that if she was bothered while away there would be dire consequences when she returned. Bea sighed and pulled a basket from a drawer below the counter. She placed the envelope in the basket, then decided to go through the mail bin and get all of Mr. Evans' mail so it would be out of the way.