The Forensic Engineer

[the start of something that's been kicking around in my head]

If when, sitting on his couch, late at night with the lights turned low, listening to an old movie or soft music and having a short glass of whiskey, he chooses to look on his life as it currently stands as fiction, then it would be this:

A pulp from the 1930’s or thereabouts, ten cents, a garish cover of primary colors with a drawing of a man holding a woman in his arms, or a man stepping from a rocket-ship, or battling a whale or some other such nonsense, promising action and intrigue or suspense within the flimsy covers. The main story would not be his story, however. His story would be buried in the latter pages, or if not buried, well, postponed.

The tag-line would be, “He could SOLVE the RIDDLE of THE GREATEST DISASTER, but he was CRIPPLED by the FAILURE of HIS ONLY LOVE!” The lead artwork that of a nattily-dressed man, khakis, rolled-up sleeves and cocked fedora, staring at the ruins of a collapsed bridge as a pretty blonde wept inconsolably in the foreground. The title, “The Forensic Engineer.”

The Forensic Engineer, Carl Orbison, the Structural Detective, the Master of Disaster, was the man who, after the bridge had fallen and the tears were wept and the teeth were gnashed and the question of “Why, God, why?” was wailed and shouted by the mournful and the angry, provided the answer in no uncertain terms.

Why, God, why?

Because moisture seeped into the structural supports and froze, and expanded, and cracked, and melted, and eroded.

Why, God, why?

Because wind caused the structure to oscillate, and that oscillation took on a frequency, and that frequency became a wave that tore the structure apart.

Why, God, why?

Because.

The forensic engineer was not God, not by a long shot. But he knew the answer.

God knew all answers. God was, is, omnipotent. But he never answered the questions, so the forensic engineer stepped in and filled in the blanks. Because that was his job, and because he knew, too.

What he didn’t know was why his marriage failed, why his love collapsed, why his closest friendship grew brittle and eventually shattered. God probably knew, but the forensic engineer, the Master of Disaster, didn’t ask.

Carl Orbison was master of all he surveyed, and all he saw was disaster.