The smell of stale cigarettes and cold coffee filled the hot Buick Park Avenue. Its air conditioner died a year ago. I was grateful for the bit of breeze I felt on my face when I climbed from the driver’s seat. Covering a jumper on Midgley Bridge wasn’t how I wanted to start the morning of my vacation to San Diego. The jumper wasn’t happy about it either.
I wanted nothing more than to get the hell out of there, but instead I approached Commander Ron and the fat motorcycle cop that hated me. I could smell junipers in the air and knew there’d be sneezing later. It was already 95 and not even 9:30 in the morning. The stink of hot asphalt crawled up my nostrils the second I stepped onto the bridge. The road over the bridge was closed due to the suicide, but was expected reopen once they removed the body. That was part of the reason I was there, to let the local know when they wouldn’t have to sit in hot traffic any more. I walked along the road snapping photos with the work camera I carried slung over my shoulder most of the time. I took pictures of the cops reporting to Commander Ron.
“Is the body still here?” I asked him.
He gestured over the edge of the bridge. “No. See?”
I peered over, expecting to see a bit of distant blood on the rocks and was surprised by the body itself – not so far away as I would have liked either. An old man. He’d landed like a rag doll after stepping up and over the railing. I could hear the two cops laughing as I jerked back my head in disgust.
Giggling, the fat cop asked, “Is that your first body, man?” He so hoped it was.
Birds chirped overhead while Commander Ron talked about the old man’s wife. She reported his intentions to the police minutes before he jumped. He’d been diagnosed with something expensive and didn’t want to burden her with the bills. Sucks to be poor.
San Diego wouldn’t be as fun as I’d hoped. I saw the old man every time I closed my eyes.
Patrick Whitehurst 
College.
College = fun.