The Spice Jar

A Story by Kaitlyn Green

A shorty story filled with the wonder of irony.

One of Mary’s favorite things to do was go garage saling, her husband said it was in her blood. It was a cool October morning and Mary was out with her girlfriends going saling. She had come across a garage sale with antiques, items not usually collected by Mary.

After rummaging through the rows of antiques, Mary found what looked like to be a beautiful wooden spice jar. Mary loved it and took it home with her.

While preparing dinner that evening Mary’s grandson, Evan, had climbed on the counter to help her prepare the fruit. While reaching for a strawberry slice covered in chocolate, Evan knocked over the spice jar.

Mary turned around upon hearing the clatter, but what was inside the jar that shocked her, the most.

She quickly picked Evan up and gave him to her husband, Steve, and Mary dashed for the phone.

“Hello this is 911, what is your emergency,” called out the police dispatcher.

“Yes, um, hello, I think I just found human remains in my spice jar,” quivered Mary as she shook with fright.

“In a spice jar?” questioned the dispatcher.

Mary just insisted that the dispatcher send a squad car to the house to investigate.

When the police man finally arrived Mary recognized the face, an old friend from high school.

“What seems to be the problem ma’am?” the police man questioned.

“I think these are human remains….” Still startled, Mary pointed in the direction where the jar is lying.

The police man checks out the jar and calls the local county forensics office to come and bag the grainy substance.

Weeks go by, and Mary still shaken up from her “DEADLY encounter” will no longer go garage saling with her girlfriends.

Late one evening she gets a call from a familiar voice. It was Sergeant Sleever, her old friend and police man that came to investigate the human remains weeks before.

“I just wanted to call and tell you Mary, that the ash remains we recovered from your “spice jar” were ashes of female. Cold case detectives and forensic DNA analysis tied the female’s remains to a thirteen year old girl, who was kidnapped back in the 1970. Now that we have her remains we can finally send closure to the little girl’s parents by telling them that we found their daughter who had been missing for over 40 years.”