Test: Do Something Truly Good! Result: Total Failure!

I have had a lot of interesting things happen to me in the bookstore over the past 8 years.  I have seen customers who were happy, sad, crying, angry, irate, lackadaisical, drunk, stoned, and homeless, although technically the bum was not a customer.  I have had people arrested in the store and even had someone threaten me with a knife once when I blocked the door when they were stealing a book.  I suppose the better end to that story would be that I fought him for the knife and the book and won, and then said "and don't come back!" as he scurried away.  However, it was only a book, so I let him pass.  I did follow him into the parking lot to get his license plate number.  He got his!

However, I have never had the opportunity to do something really great!  I have certainly gone above and beyond for people before, but the opportunity that presented itself last week would truly have topped them all.  

I got a call last week from a police officer on campus.  She introduced herself and then said these exact words, "I'm calling you in regards to an open murder investigation from 2005."  WHAT?  I'm pretty sure I have never killed anyone, and certainly not in 2005.  I lived in Las Vegas then.  If anybody was going down it was the hick in Sin City!  I stayed quiet on the phone, thinking I was about to be accused or punk'd.  After an absurdly long pause, she kind of laughed and said, "I bet you are wondering how this pertains to you?"  It was like she was reading my mind!  I laughed too, and agreed that I was, indeed, interested to know how this pertained to me.  She explained that a student had gone missing in September of 2005 and his body was never found.  She continued, explaining that his then girlfriend had stolen books out of his truck and sold them back at the bookstore.  They knew she had done it, but needed paper proof in order to solidify their case and charge her with his murder.  Obviously, they had more than this on her, but were trying to gather as much proof as they could. We talked a little more and agreed that we would talk again soon after I tried to find out some information.  

This may not have been an appropriate response to a request to help with a murder investigation, but I was stoked!  My mind immediately ran away with this one!  All those years of mystery novels and who-dun-it television were finally going to pay off!  I was going to do James Patterson, Agatha Christie and Mary Higgins Clark all proud!  I was going to be Matlock's assistant sleuth or one of Angela Lansbury's junior detectives!  Even Perry Mason would have been impressed with this one!  

I'm sure this will surprise all two of you reading this blog, but things did not turn out how they would have on Murder, She Wrote.  First of all, we are a new B&N store and our systems do not have any information from before this past June.  Secondly, the previous computer system has been totally wiped clean.  Even CSI couldn't crack this one!  And lastly, the whole case hinges on whether or not an audit trail from December 2005 was even printed.  If it was, it is filed somewhere among 30 or so banker boxes spread out in storage closets all over campus.  

Quite anticlimactic, huh?  That's what I thought!  Hopefully something will come to fruition with the files.  Until then, my one change to do something good that could have truly long lasting effects was an utter failure!  Maybe next time!