Chapter 141: The Clown is Actually Me!
"Can you speak plain English?" Susan complained. "Even you don't have a way to deal with it?"
"No," Chuck shook his head. "Your IRS was targeted by call center scammers with Indian accents for wire fraud. This was the first case Director McGrath recommended to me because he knew I liked challenging cases, but after a quick review, I chose to pass."
"Why?" Susan was puzzled. "I know it's not safe for women there, and I don't have strong partners I can trust. I really wouldn't dare go alone, but you shouldn't be afraid of these things, right?"
"You're wrong. Gender isn't the issue there, and race even less so," Chuck said. "The reason I declined wasn't because of what you're thinking, but after understanding their criminal network, I knew there was no way to effectively investigate. The real criminals are in India. You haven't been there—you don't know the situation. Get close and people will target you, then everyone becomes your enemy. Even if you catch them, what's the point? Catch one today, there will be ten or a hundred tomorrow. More and more people, and the fraud amounts will only increase."
"..." Susan was speechless. After a while, she said unconvincingly, "Then according to you, we shouldn't handle any cases, because all cases repeat—they happen over and over."
"That's why I mainly participate in novel and interesting cases," Chuck said calmly. "The rest don't concern me."
"You..." Susan said unhappily. "In your eyes, if we insist on handling cases that aren't interesting, is it meaningless?"
"For me, yes," Chuck nodded. "For most people, too."
Susan wanted to argue, but when she met Chuck's gaze, she suddenly thought that although she'd won the case, at most the IRS collected substantial taxes. For the Gambino family, it was just a financial loss—it didn't seriously hurt them. They could still operate as before. For ordinary people, nothing really changed. She couldn't help feeling somewhat empty about it.
Just then, Chuck's phone rang. It was Monica. "Chuck, get over here! Mr. Heckles is dead!"
"I'll be right there," Chuck promised, nodded to Susan, and left.
"That guy," Susan shook her head watching Chuck leave. She collected herself and left too.
Downstairs from Monica's apartment, in Mr. Heckles' place, a group of people had gathered.
When Chuck arrived, the door was already open. Inside, the group of friends was looking at piles of junk and complaining.
"Chuck, you're here," Monica saw Chuck at the door and hurried over. "You won't believe it! Mr. Heckles is dead."
She leaned close to Chuck and whispered, "I heard he was still holding a mop when he died. The super thought he was cleaning, and Rachel suspects..."
"I checked—it was sudden cardiac arrest," Chuck shook his head. "A very normal way to die."
On his way over, he'd called Detective Amy Santiago for information.
"Everyone says it's so happy it's deadly," Chandler heard this and joked. "Now we're really happy—so happy it's deadly!"
"Chandler!" Monica glared at him through gritted teeth. "You're making jokes at a time like this?!"
"Sorry," Chandler made a zipping motion across his mouth.
"What's even more touching is that Mr. Heckles actually left his estate to us," Monica said with mixed emotions. "I always thought Mr. Heckles hated us..."
"He did. In his will, he called us 'the noisy girls upstairs.' You're number one, I'm number two," Rachel continued. "More importantly, there's no money in the estate."
"That's right," Monica said, looking around. "But even though it's all junk, he chose to leave it to us instead of his twin brother in New Mexico. What does that mean?"
"It means he loves his brother," Rachel complained. "So he didn't want to burden his brother with coming all this way just to inherit garbage. Who would want that? Unless his brother's a garbage collector, then this would be brotherly love."
Initially, she was deeply moved that Mr. Heckles, who'd always been at odds with them, had left them an inheritance. She immediately asked the crucial question: "So let's talk about the money."
But unfortunately, the lawyer instantly dashed her hopes. Mr. Heckles hadn't left a dime.
Her emotions crashed immediately.
Although she suspected they were involved in Mr. Heckles' death, she wasn't the only one who stomped and made noise. It originally started because of Chuck and Monica.
Besides, even when nothing was happening, they had normal gatherings without making noise, and Mr. Heckles still found fault with them regularly.
So this was just an accident. She didn't think it was their fault.
"Rachel!" Monica interrupted dissatisfied. "This shows he loved us. Though he often bothered us, it was actually because he was too lonely and wanted to connect with the outside world. He'd bang the ceiling and we'd stomp back in response. For him, that was communication. Poor Mr. Heckles."
"Communicating with sticks—sounds familiar," Chandler's joke slipped out again, his eyes glancing meaningfully at Chuck and Monica.
"..." Monica was completely speechless and just stared at Chandler with murderous intent.
"Hey!" Phoebe emerged from the back room with a notebook. "Look! Mr. Heckles wrote everything down."
"Oh my God, oh my God," Chandler quickly escaped Monica's deadly glare, ran over, grabbed the notebook from Phoebe, and opened it. "April 26th, loud noise, Italian guy brought home a new girlfriend. Ha, he really did record everything."
"Keep reading!" Phoebe laughed behind him.
"..." Chandler glanced at her, his smile freezing. But meeting Phoebe's knowing look, he—being skilled at self-deprecation—simply read the rest: "April 29th, loud noise, Italian guy's gay roommate bought a dryer."
"Mr. Heckles actually wrote everything down, and in such a funny way," Phoebe said with a grin.
"Come on! Is that funny?" Chandler said unhappily. "Humor is for people like me, not for Mr. Heckles with his perpetual stone face..."
He couldn't continue because Chuck was staring at him expressionlessly.
"Well, you can be funny with a straight face, but Mr. Heckles definitely wasn't one of them," Chandler said smoothly.
"That's debatable," Ross also came out from the back room carrying a large yearbook. He glanced at Chuck and shook his head. "There's nothing special about being funny with a straight face. Many people are like that. Mr. Heckles was one of them!"
"Impossible!" Chandler simply didn't believe it.
"If you don't believe me, look," Ross opened the large yearbook in front of everyone and read classmate signatures. "Heckles, you can make me laugh even in chemistry class. You're the funniest kid in school."
"Funniest?" Chandler exclaimed. "That's impossible!"
"If you don't believe it, look. He was pretty cute as a kid," Phoebe pointed out.
Chandler snatched the yearbook and flipped through it, commenting, "Not cute, just normal... Hey, he was voted class clown. Me too."
His expression faltered as he continued flipping. "He played clarinet in band. Me too. He was in drama club. Me too."
Just then, noise came from upstairs. Everyone looked up, and Chandler muttered, "That noise is really loud."
As the noise continued, Chandler, irritated, picked up a mop and banged it against the ceiling toward the sound.
"Oh my God!" Phoebe covered her mouth, staring at Chandler in disbelief. Pointing at him, she said, "Mr. Heckles is possessing you."
She believed in the supernatural and often felt visited by spirits of deceased relatives.
"Damn!" Chandler, realizing what he'd done, dropped the mop Mr. Heckles had been holding when he died and cried out in horror, "Oh my God! I am Mr. Heckles!"
"I think you meant 'Mom!'" Chuck corrected him.
"Hahaha," Everyone burst into laughter.
Actually, Chandler's habit was to yell curse words when surprised—not referring to his father, but simply expressing shock.
But when Chuck said that, the meaning changed completely, immediately reminding everyone of Chandler's bizarre family situation. Chandler seemed to have no father now, only two mothers.
"I know what happened. It must be Mr. Heckles' spirit," Phoebe laughed, nodding repeatedly, and waved at Chandler. "Hey, Mr. Heckles, how are you doing?"
"It's not that Mr. Heckles possessed me—it's that I'm just another Mr. Heckles," Chandler exclaimed. "Look at our interests and hobbies, look at what people said about us. Remember Janice? Every time we broke up, she'd say, 'Chandler Bing, you're going to end up alone!' Oh my God! Mr. Heckles' present is my future. Mr. Heckles is me!"
"Not exactly the same," Chuck shook his head.
"What's the difference?" Chandler said self-deprecatingly. "If you mean I'm better looking than him, there's no need to mention it. I know that doesn't change the outcome."
"It does," Chuck said bluntly. "Mr. Heckles banged the ceiling with a mop, and you probably do the opposite."
"Hahaha," Everyone laughed again.
"But it's the same result for you," Monica looked at Chandler mockingly. "It's all 'so happy it's deadly,' right?"
Chandler: "..."
(End of Chapter)
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