The Four Before Me

by E H Night

  Alice grabbed the mugs and carried them back over to the sink. “Thanks for stopping by, and don’t worry. It’s nice knowing that there’s someone looking out for me, especially now that...” her voice trailed off as she thought of Jessica’s photo from the poster.

  Detective Darrow looked at her knowingly. “We don’t know what or who we’re dealing with out there. Just keep your doors and windows locked, and try to let someone know what you’re doing and where you’ll be if you decide to go out somewhere.” He stood up, walked toward the living room, and paused by the front door. “Oh, and one more thing,” he began again. “You’re working at Edna’s now, right?”

  “Wow, you just know everything, huh?” Alice said, surprised. “Yeah, she agreed to give me a booth. Why? What’s up?”

  “If you wouldn’t mind, could I stop in sometime? I’ll be due for a haircut soon. Gotta stay sharp.”

  “Come by whenever,” Alice replied, rolling her eyes to disguise her amusement. “Now get out of here. Don’t you have a bad guy to catch or something?”

  Detective Darrow smiled and walked out the door, pausing briefly to turn around and look at Alice one more time before continuing on toward his car.

  Alice waved and shut the door behind him.“What a strange man.” she thought. “These small town cops get really personal.”

  Her friendly mask faded, and worry appeared across her face once more in its place.

  ◆

  That evening after work, Alice got out of her car and walked over to Tiffany’s porch instead of her own. With Detective Darrow’s request still on her mind, she figured that it would probably be best to check on her neighbor sooner, rather than later. She approached the door and knocked gently, hoping that she wouldn’t startle her too much. For extra reassurance, she decided to announce her identity.

  “Tiffany? It’s me, Alice, from next door.” She paused, wondering if she was being more intrusive than helpful.

  The door knob rattled for a second before it turned completely, and Tiffany’s face appeared in front of her. “Alice. Thank God it’s just you,” she said, exasperated. “I’m guessing you’ve already heard what happened.”

  “I haven’t heard much, but I wanted to check on you. I don’t think the news has spread too far. Even the ladies over at Edna’s weren’t talking about it yet. From my understanding, that’s where news usually travels first.”

  Tiffany grinned. “You’re not wrong, I guess. Here, come in.”

  Alice followed her inside and into the living room. At first glance, the house seemed to have a very similar layout to her own, but it was far more decorated. Paintings and other artwork covered the beige walls, and ceramic knickknacks occupied most of the space on her tables and counter-tops. The air was filled with the fragrances of several differing candles, making the combined scent unidentifiable and completely unique. She sat down on the small worn couch and watched as Tiffany headed toward the kitchen.

  “Help yourself to the remote. I’ll grab us a few drinks. You like beer, right?” Tiffany called out as she walked toward the refrigerator.

  “Beer’s fine. Oh, um, hey, Tiffany?”

  “Yeah, what’s up?” she asked as she returned with two frosty cans in her grip.

  Alice reached out to accept one and quickly cracked it open. “Do you think the others will turn up?” she asked before taking a small sip. “I mean, do you think they could be buried somewhere around here too?”

  Tiffany stood frozen for a moment. “I — Wow. You really just jump right into the good questions, huh?”

  Alice put her hand over her mouth dramatically before attempting to explain herself. “Shit. I didn’t mean to. It’s just, this has been on my mind all day. I’m really sorry… honestly.”

  Tiffany shook her head and replied. “No, it’s okay. I understand. I’ve been thinking about the other girls too. I was able to listen in on some of the conversations at the station, and I heard that the cops did a quick search of the area, but didn’t find anything else. Who knows what could have happened, really...”

  Alice took a few deep gulps from her beer. “You’re doing okay, though, right?” she asked, feeling rude for her lack of tact.

  Tiffany nodded. “It was terrifying — I won’t lie, but to be honest, I feel more numb now than anything.” She took a long swig and blew a muted burp to the side. “It’s weird. It feels like a dream, I guess. Maybe it just hasn’t really hit me yet.”

  Alice finished her beer after a few more gulps and sat the empty can down on the coffee table. “I know that we don’t really know each other yet, but I do know what it’s like to have to go through things on your own, and hard it can be to open up to someone. Just know that my door’s always open to you, no matter what time it is, or what you need. You can always stop by.”

  Tiffany looked up from the table to meet Alice’s eyes. “You’re a lot like her, ya know.”

  “Like who?” Alice asked with a confused expression.

  “Sarah,” she answered softly, as if the name was a secret. She began picking nervously at her fingernails and continued her thought process. “She had a big heart. I don’t know of one person who didn’t enjoy being around her. She really was magnetic. Wherever we would go, people would stop what they were doing to see how she was or what her plans were later. She was probably the only reason I even had friends.” Tiffany stopped speaking for a moment to wipe her eyes. “I’m sorry. Maybe I’m a little sensitive after all.”

  Alice scooted closer to pat Tiffany gently and comfortingly on her back. “I understand. You don’t need to apologize for anything. This is a lot for anyone to handle, and you’ve lost a friend on top of it all. You’d have to be as cold as ice to not react in some way.”

  “Thanks, it’s just that —” Tiffany began again, “I really miss her, and when I fell… in the woods…” Her voice became more tight and strained as she continued. “… For a second, I thought that it was her. This is going to sound crazy, but I was almost relieved when I thought it was Sarah’s body.”

  Alice looked up at her, startled, and stopped patting her on the back. She froze as if she’d just seen a ghost, and was suddenly very concerned with the direction the conversation was taking. Her face was unable to mask her uncomfortable expression or her startled eyes.

  “Dammit. Don’t look at me like that,” Tiffany said defensively as she brushed Alice’s heavy hand from her shoulder. “I know what you’re thinking and that’s not what I meant. I’d never wish harm on her. She was my best friend.” She wiped her eyes once more and stood up from the couch. “Sorry again, I didn’t mean to get upset like that,” she stated as she walked back toward the kitchen for more beer. “It’s just really hard not knowing what happened. I think it’s even harder than finding the dead body to be completely honest. Sarah’s been gone for almost two months now and no one has any leads or answers. I feel like I’m going crazy just waiting around.”

  Alice nodded. “I think I know what you mean. I just lost my grandmother before moving here, and the circumstances surrounding her death were, well, not exactly normal. I’d do almost anything for answers, including moving to a small town where I don’t know anyone, apparently.”

  “Really? How’d she pass?” Tiffany asked.

  “It was a train,” she said. “The cops told me that she had been out on the tracks late at night and wouldn’t move no matter how many times the horn was sounded. The engineer told them that she didn’t even look back once.” Alice coughed lightly and looked down at her feet. “She just kept walking. They called it an accident, but I really don’t see how. Her sight and hearing were fine. She wasn’t in perfect health, but she definitely could have moved out of the way. I don’t even know why she was out there. She hated trains.”

  “Goodness, I’m so sorry. Did she talk to anyone before she went, or had she been acting differently?” Tiffany asked, suddenly very interested.

  Alice looked up. “She hadn’t talked to anyone that I know of, and she
seemed fine that morning, too. That’s the reason I’m here though. She grew up in Wintersburg, and I feel like even though I’ll probably never know what really happened, I can be a little closer to her here.”

  Tiffany nodded. “Thanks for sharing that with me. I guess we have even more in common than I thought.”

  “There’s always company in pain,” Alice replied, looking up with a partial smile.

  “I can drink to that!” Tiffany said, holding a beer in the air.

  Alice grabbed another one off of the table, popped the tab, and raised the can as well.

  “Cheers, if we can even call it that.”

  “Cheers.”

  Chapter 4

  “Three’s Company”

  The salon seemed different the following day. There were women under every dryer and in every styling chair, including Alice’s. It was as if the blow dryers were mimicking the static-laced sounds of a television, and the hair foils were the closest thing to an antennae in the area. Everyone tuned in to hear the news, share the news, and make up their own news related to the body that had been found near the lake. Alice had finally began to truly understand the warnings that she had been receiving about the amount of gossip that plagued the town. She was a hairdresser after all, so she definitely was no stranger to juicy stories, ranging from marital troubles to election scandals, but Wintersburg had its own unique style. While many things were fact-checked, corrected, or just blatantly dismissed by her previous clientele, no one in this town listened to anything unless it was flavored with exciting misinformation.

  “That’s what she gets for being drunk all the time. I haven’t seen her sober since she was a kid in Sunday school,” a plump elderly woman said as she slightly raised the hood of her dryer. “I bet she ran off with the first person to offer her a bed and a bottle.” The woman nodded, agreeing with herself. “She probably tried to steal from someone and got what she deserved instead.”

  A frail woman in the seat next to her lifted an index finger up to her lips and shook her head in protest. “Eleanor, we all know she was a lush, but that doesn’t mean she deserved to be left out in a shallow grave somewhere. Goodness gracious,” she stated, scolding the woman like a child. “Let’s not pretend like your son doesn’t do his fair share of drinking, also.”

  “My son is a good man. He’s not some bar-hopping wretch like Jessica. For Pete’s sake, she was almost 30 and never worked a day in her life, unless you count those nights she spent lying on her back for every trucker who passed through here.”

  “Daniel might be a good man, but I heard that he thought Jess was pretty good, too,” a slightly younger woman chimed in from the waiting area. “I saw them making out last year at Kirt’s Pub. If you ask me, I think he would have laid on his back for her.”

  A few women struggled to keep their amusement and giggles hidden.

  “What do you know, June?” Eleanor replied sarcastically to the woman, clearly offended and ashamed. “I’m surprised you can even see anything with those hideous bangs in your eyes anyway.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Keep on talking. Get your cardio for the day by runnin’ your mouth, grandma. Girls keep going missing, and you could be added to that list at any moment if anyone was able to lift your ass off of the couch.”

  Eleanor sighed defeatedly and shifted her weight in the chair.

  The frail woman made eye contact with June and shook her head gently. She quickly tilted her chin upward and gestured toward a dark-haired woman who sat motionlessly, receiving a perm from a very visibly uncomfortable stylist.

  The salon went cold and silent for a moment until the muffled sounds of crying made themselves more noticeable. The dark haired woman, about fifty years old, had gotten up to grab a tissue from the front desk. She stood there, still, like a small and withered tree, wiping the dew from her eyes.

  “Betty, they’ll find Sarah. She wasn’t wild like the others,” Edna said while combing through the curls of one of her clients. “The other three were known for getting into trouble. Sarah was a good girl. She probably just wanted to get out and see the world. You know how the young ones are these days. There’s not much of a future for them in a place like this.”

  Betty sobbed louder and darted toward the exit, with rollers still pinned in her hair.

  “What was that about?” Alice asked, looking around the room in surprise.

  “That’s one of the missing girl’s moms,” Eleanor stated. “The fourth girl, Sarah. Actually, didn’t you just move into her old house?”

  “Geez, you know everyone’s business, don’t you?” June piped up from the waiting area.

  “Edna, can you comb her hair out?” Alice asked, pointing to the woman in her styling chair as she ran outside, chasing after Betty.

  Before Edna could properly respond, Alice ran out the door in an attempt to catch up to Betty before she could drive away. She saw a glimpse of her across the parking lot and caught up just as she had hopped inside and closed the door. Alice tapped gently on the glass window.

  “Betty? I know you don’t know me, but you seem like you need someone to talk to right now,” she said, while internally questioning why she even had such a strong urge to follow this woman.

  Betty leaned forward and rolled her window down while Alice continued speaking.

  “My name’s Alice. I didn’t know your daughter, but —” She tried to come up with a reasonable explanation.

  Betty pointed to the seat beside her and unlocked the passenger’s-side door. She grabbed a pack of cigarettes from the purse in her lap and lit one with the lighter that shook softly in her weak hand. The woman’s cropped black hair was partially set into orange plastic rollers which had become loose from the wind. Between the smoke that escaped from her mouth and nose, and the combination of colors, she looked like Halloween, but not in the frightening way. She was more like a pale jack-o’-lantern who had just happened to light her own flame. Though, she did appear to have been dramatically withered from a season’s change. It was as if she had been left on the porch to dry out and become nature’s responsibility to clean up and do away with.

  Alice made her way over to the door and let herself inside. The car smelled like fire and old vanilla candles — the ones that could often be found stored away in a forgotten closet with a thick layer of dust caked to the wick. Once she plopped down, her pantyhose snagged against a piece of torn faux-leather that had been protruding defiantly from the seat. She moved her hand downward, and applied pressure to the runner, hoping that she could stop it from traveling any more.

  “Oh, darn it. I’ve got a run in my hose again,” Alice said with a hushed and frustrated voice.

  Betty shifted in her seat and reached behind her to the floor. She retrieved a small black purse and began to dig through its contents.“Here. Use this,” she said as she lifted a clear bottle of nail polish in the air. “Paint it across the whole thing, and it’ll keep it from getting bigger.”

  Alice grabbed the glass bottle and smiled slightly. She twirled it in between her fingertips while appreciating the way that it reflected the light like a polished crystal. Her grandmother’s once-sparkling eyes came into her mind, and she stopped moving it around. “You know, my grandma always used nail polish for these type of things too. She never thought to buy a clear one though, so she always had a few bright colored splotches all over her legs.” She let out a little laugh. “I remember always thinking that the holes would have looked less obvious than the polish, even as a little girl.”

  Betty gave her a small smile and continued to blow smoke all around the car. Her chest raised and lowered at a steadier speed than before, and it became apparent that she was finally calming down. The puffy bags under her eyes seemed to be bruised and swollen, probably from a lack of sleep and an abundance of tears. They were the evidence of the type of mourning that only a parent could be capable of knowing — the type of emptiness that could cause a heart to fail or a mind to shatter.

  “I used to paint
Sarah’s nails every Saturday,” Betty began. “When she was little, I mean. I used to take her down to the lake in the mornings, and we’d skip stones until our hands were absolutely filthy.” She paused for a second to stare at her veiny thrombosed hands and a hot tear trailed down her chin and neck. She wiped it away and pursed her lips into a shape that almost resembled a heart. “I’d tell her that we had no choice but to get manicures afterward, that we had to look pretty in case there were any handsome princes around. I’d pull out the same red polish from my pocket and hide it under a few stones when she would look away. Sarah! I’d call to her. Sarah, look what I’ve found! and then I’d dig it out of the rubble, hinting that a fairy must have left it for us. She’d always act so surprised, but I knew that she was just playing along. We’d rinse our hands in the lake water and sit together on one of the large flat rocks. Then, she’d give me one of her little hands, and I’d paint each nail while telling her stories about frogs, princesses, and castles...”