Janice is Missing

by Rod Kackley

  A train was going by on his right. For some reason, the sound of a train, and its whistle, especially at night always made Tim feel good. It was like no matter what else happened, that train was always going to be there, going through St. Isidore at the same time once every day on its way out of town, and once on its way back through town at night.

  Every day, every night, the train will outlive us all. Tim just knew it. That feels good.

  An alarm on Tim’s smartphone vibrated.

  It was the alarm on his bedroom door.

  Someone or something had broken the electric eye beam.

  Tim’s phone rang.

  It was Paul.

  "Janice is upstairs,” Tim said.

  "I knew you were wrong on this," Paul said. "I knew you were wrong about her. We don’t need her. We have each other.”

  "I need her. I need her."

  "She fucked up didn’t she? They always fuck up."

  Tim was driving faster, rocking again, rocking back and forth behind the wheel, forward and backward, driving faster, swinging faster.

  He knew Paul was right. Paul had been correct all along.

  They always fucked up.

  They always died.

  Now, Janice had fucked up.

  Twenty Five

  The idea that a whole town would ignore the deaths of Lord knows how many girls who were found swinging with broken necks in the trees of St. Isidore Park blew Joy away.

  “Are you telling me nobody investigating the deaths because they would rather believe they were suicides instead of finding out if one of their neighbors was a serial killer?”

  Jimmy Mack nodded, agreeing with Joy on both of her points. It was incredible to think that people would ignore the possibility of a murder walking among them, and yes, St. Isidore did believe its own urban legend that girls and sometimes boys, were killing themselves in the park.

  His nod included an admission of guilt. Jimmy Mack had known the truth. Or at least he was as sure of it as he could be without winning a conviction in court. But maybe, just perhaps, he had given up too easy.

  Jimmy’s career had been ruined when his fellow officer, Lumpy Doolan, told the community what it wanted to hear and leapfrogged over Jimmy, bypassed another officer of the same age, John Sheldon, and eventually became the police chief of St. Isidore.

  But now Jimmy had a chance to make amends, to set things right. He, Joy, and Amanda were on their way to Tim Sheldon’s house. For all of the years since Tim’s brother, John had discovered the first two bodies, Jimmy had found one piece of evidence after another that pointed to Tim as the killer.

  Jimmy always felt like Tim must have had an accomplice, but had not been able to put his fat finger on who that might be.

  He and Amanda had explained almost all of that to Joy, all except the part about the mysterious accomplice, and Jimmy was ready to start all over again if need be until a text from headquarters derailed that train of thought.

  It was bad news.

  “Holy fuck,” Joy yelled so loudly that Amanda nearly drove their official St. Isidore Chronicle car up and over a curb.

  “What is wrong?” Amanda said

  Jimmy snapped his phone shut. No smartphones for the St. Isidore P. D., Chief Lumpy Doolan had proclaimed as he proudly showed the City Council how he was saving the city money that the council could spread around to their supporters and donors.

  “Obama phones are good enough for us,” said Doolan.

  Even at Jimmy’s age, Sgt. McKenzie understood that Doolan only said that because he didn’t know what technology could have done regarding solving crimes faster and better. But most importantly Doolan was must concerned with puckering up and kissing ass in St. Isidore City Hall just as quickly and often as he could.

  His bad news could wait, for Joy to explain her 'Oh, Fuck' moment, Jimmy decided.

  “You are not going to believe this,” said Joy. “Both of them, Janice and Allie, are in Tim Sheldon’s house. They got free.”

  ‘No!” shouted Amanda as she pushed her foot down on the accelerator and blew through a red light.

  “They sent me an email,” said Joy. “They got on to a computer in Sheldon’s house, found the Janice is Missing and Allie is Missing Facebook pages, along with a few of the stories we wrote, got my email address, and...”

  She was interrupted by the chime notification on Amanda’s phone. Never one to heed the warnings about texting and driving, she turned on her smartphone, glanced at the screen, and shouted, “They just sent me an email too.”

  Amanda used her knees to steer the car, and while Jimmy crossed himself and prayed to spend eternity at the side of his Lord and Savior, she sent an email to Allie and Janice, telling them a rescue mission was on the way.

  “We are maybe twenty or twenty-five minutes away from Tim Sheldon’s house,” Joy said after checking her MapQuest app.

  Jimmy took a look at her phone, was amazed by technology that he and the rest of the Swinging Izzy P. D. didn’t even know existed, and tapped out another text to his comrades-in-arms at headquarters.

  The reply came back almost instantly.

  “Oh for Christ’s sake,” Jimmy said, snapping his phone shut so hard he nearly broke the cover.

  “What?” Joy said.

  “We are on our own.”

  “What do you mean, ‘on our own?’” Amanda said, taking the words right out of Joy’s mouth.

  “I mean we are on our fucking own,” Jimmy said. “No fucking back up. Paul Desmond, our dispatcher, told me twice now that they don’t have any extra officers to send our way. We are on our fucking own.”

  “So what?” Amanda said. “We know the women are in the house. We know they are okay. And we know they are alone. Why do we need fucking backup?”

  Joy was chewing her lower lip. She liked the prospect of going into this alone even less than Jimmy.

  “Not you too,” Amanda said to her boss. “We can do this, Joy. We are going to be heroes.”

  Joy paused, took a deep breath, and went all honest on Amanda.

  “Amanda, my goal has always been to get out St. Isidore as soon as possible. I have never been here for the long haul. Now, after hearing how the town ignored evidence of an apparent serial killer in their midst for all of these years, my skin is crawling.”

  Jimmy nodded in the affirmative. He understood only too well why Joy had always wanted to blow this pop stand called St. Isidore as soon as possible and why she was more concerned now with just getting out alive.

  He and at least one other officer on the force had felt the same way. John Sheldon left. Jimmy stayed.

  On top of the misgivings that had weighed him down from that first day of the discovery of dead bodies in St. Isidore Park until this day when he might actually clear the case, Jimmy had another big concern that was heavier than Joy and Amanda could realize.

  But he tried to explain, anyway.

  "No cop wants to go into a potentially dangerous situation alone. Even the bravest cop wants backup. And the smartest cops wait for backup," Jimmy said as much to himself as to Joy and Amanda.

  "We should wait. We might be walking into an ambush," Jimmy muttered.

  "Oh fuck it," Jimmy said to Amanda while Joy chewed her lip. "Keep driving."

  Twenty Six

  Under normal circumstances, Janice and Allie were so filthy that they would not have been able to stand each other or even themselves.

  Now here they were wearing men’s boxer briefs that barely stayed up, khaki slacks and black t-shirts. Neither woman would've ever dreamed of wearing anything like these clothes outside of a Halloween party.

  And they smelled. It was a low, rank, raunchy stink that emanated from every pore of their bodies. Janice and Allie should have been more than embarrassed to be seen like this, and certainly, would never dream of being in the same room with anyone in this condition.

  But this day was unlike any they had ever experienced, and after the last days, weeks, or months �
� they had long ago given up trying to keep track of anything as inconsequential as the time when you are being held as a sex prisoner — it was a day worth celebrating.

  Janice couldn’t wait to get way from this house of horrors. Janice had been beaten, raped, sodomized, treated worse than a dog, day after day, night after night.

  All Janice wanted to do was get out and as far away as possible. She was on her way out of the bedroom, leading Allie by the arm when Janice felt herself being pulled back.

  Allie was crying. Little rivers of tears coursed lines down her cheeks as trickling streams of water cut through the dirt encrusted on her face. Janice, who was holding Allie by the wrist, turned and looked back.

  “It’s time to go,” Janice whispered.

  “Okay,” Allie said as she cried softly.

  “Oh, baby,” Janice said as she put her arms around Allie’s neck and slowly danced with her new best friend.

  Allie stopped crying, sniffed once or twice, used her dirty fingers to remove the tears from her eyes and laughed.

  The women, who shared a bond of survival that no other two people in the world could have, began dancing faster. They swayed back and forth, Allie’s hands on Janice’s hips, Janice’s arms around Allie's neck.

  They laughed together.

  Allie and Janice kissed.

  It was a long, erotic, beautiful kiss. It had been so long since either of them had felt like this. Especially for Janice, the abuse she suffered at the hands of whoever was the warden of her prison, had become routine. She had forgotten what it was like to feel this good.

  Janice didn't want it to end. But she knew it must. She had to take the lead.

  Janice pushed Allie back just a bit when the kiss ended, took a breath, and looked down at the MacBook. It showed a new email had come in.

  “We are on the way from the Chronicle! A cop is with us! Getting closer! Amanda.”

  The women cheered.

  Janice thought for a moment, wondering if it could be her Amanda who sent the email.

  Probably not, Janice decided. How could it be her?

  “Let’s send Amanda a picture,” Allie said.

  "Janice."

  “Wait. Did you hear that?”

  “Hear what?”

  "That! Did you hear that noise?"

  "You’re paranoid.”

  “Oh right, and like that's a bad thing? Like, I don’t have a reason to be paranoid? After what we went through, you should be too.”

  “Oh come on. Nobody is here. We are free! Let's take a photo and send it to Amanda or whoever at the Chronicle. It will be perfect for the front page of tomorrow’s paper.”

  “We need to go,” Janice said as she nervously looked back over her shoulder and started chewing on her lower lip.

  “Baby, relax,” Allie said, brushing a fingertip over Janice’s lips. “Nobody is here. Nobody is every going to hurt us again.”

  “Shh. It’s a car. I heard it. It’s closer.” Janice was getting frantic. Allie held her close.

  “The street is right out there,” Allie said, pointing at the Venetian blinds drawn closed. “The cars are going past us.”

  “We need to get out there.”

  “Just one picture. I want the reporters to have it. Please.”

  Janice was not usually the one in any of her relationships to show better judgment, but this time, the right decision seemed so obvious to her. The time to run was now.

  “Okay,” Janice said, against her better judgment. “Just one picture and then we run.”

  “Yay!” Allie said as she applauded softly the way a child might when a parent gives in to her whining.

  Allie clicked on the MacBook Air’s Photo Booth app and got into position with Janice.

  Janice couldn’t help chewing on her lip as the app counted down, three, two, one, before snapping the photo. Allie looked over, and to get Janice to smile, gave her a spank on the butt.

  Just as the Photo Booth app snapped — it sounded just like a camera, Janice thought — Allie gave her a quick kiss on the cheek.

  Now, that made Janice smile and even laugh.

  “Fine,” Janice said. “Let’s do another.”

  She clicked on the little camera icon on the app, put her arm around Allie’s waist and pulled her close before returning the favor of a kiss on the cheek as the camera snapped another picture.

  Janice hadn’t laughed this loud, or even heard real joyous laughter, in what seemed like a lifetime. It felt so good after so long to be actually enjoying herself.

  She didn’t want to release Allie. They had won. Janice and Allie had survived the nightmare of being held as sex prisoners in a pervert’s basement.

  But now they were free. More importantly, Janice and Allie were going to get justice, and revenge.

  Allie and Janice held each other at the waist.

  “We are going to make them pay,” Janice said. “You know that don’t you?”

  Allie nodded.

  It was time to make sure Allie understood what could turn out to be a gruesome truth.

  “That means we are going to have to go public, right?”

  Allie nodded again.

  “They might say we were willing, that it was all our idea,” Janice said.

  This time, Allie chewed on her lip.

  “Nobody would believe that, right?” Allie asked.

  “Nobody should believe that, but they will still say it. We have to be strong, for each other.”

  “For each other,” Allie agreed.

  “Now we send the photos to that woman, Amanda, at the Chronicle,” Janice said. “Show me how.”

  Allie got enough of her arm out of Janice’s embrace to tap the Photo Booth app a few times and send the pictures they had taken to Amanda’s email at the St. Isidore Chronicle.

  “It’s done,” Allie said.

  “Now it starts,” said Janice.

  Allie just looked at the woman who would lead her through the rest of this nightmare.

  “Now we start getting our justice,” Janice explained. “And our revenge.”

  “And our revenge,” said Allie.

  The woman held each other close again, smiled, and kissed.

  A new journey was beginning, Janice was confident that the bond she and Allie had forged would last the rest of their lives. She could feel it.

  “Let’s take one more picture, just for us,” Janice said.

  “We have time for one more?”

  Janice nodded. She kissed Allie deeply.

  Allie was out of breath when Janice’s lips released hers.

  She took a deep breath, pushed a strand of oily hair way from her eyes, and opened the Photo Booth app again.

  Allie clicked the button to start the photo countdown, and get beside Janice for a picture they would have forever.

  The women looked at the MacBook screen, its Photo Booth app, and they saw him.

  He was right behind them.

  Twenty Seven

  “Oh my God! Look at these poor women,” Amanda said pushing her smartphone toward Joy.

  “Sweet Jesus,” Joy whispered.

  One of the women, Joy thought it was Janice, seemed to be missing a front tooth as she smiled at the camera. And the other, maybe that was Allie, either had a dark brown smudge of mud on her face or there was an ugly bruise that ran down the side of her face from her temple to the jaw line.

  The men’s shirts and pants the women were wearing made them look even worse. The taller of the women, the one who could have been Janice, might have been over 5’10” but she didn’t come close to filling out the khaki pants and checked shirt she was wearing. The shorter one, Allie, looked even more ridiculous. The outfit she had one would have been a perfect fit for an elephant.

  “Look,” Amanda said as she leaned over the front seat of the Chronicle News car to show Jimmy.

  He glanced at the phone quickly, taking his eyes off the road for just a moment. Jimmy had taken over the wheel from Joy. Being a cop,
he was used to going as fast as he wanted, signaling when it suited him and never worrying about staying in the correct lane.

  Jimmy accused Joy of driving slower than his grandmother’s hearse when he demanded that she stop and let him drive.

  "Pull over," he had shouted.

  Joy wondered for a moment if he was going to give her a speeding ticket. Jimmy’s voice had a cop’s edge to it.

  He can't help it, Joy thought. Poor guy was probably born that way.

  “Goddamn it!” Jimmy roared and slammed his fist on the steering wheel. Traffic was backed up. Afternoon rush hour, such as it was in St. Isidore, had stopped him.

  Joy and Amanda were so juiced after seeing the pictures of Allie and Janice, they were ready to get out of the car and run the rest of the way to Tim Sheldon’s house.

  But Joy, always being the reporter who wanted more than anything to get her byline above the fold on the front page, took a moment to send the pictures of Allie and Janice to the copy desk back at the Chronicle’s headquarters.

  “Resolution is a bit low,” she wrote in her email to the copy desk. “But we should be able to use them in the online edition.”

  Amanda wasn’t far behind Joy when it came to being a life-support system for a front-page, heat-seeking missile. After forwarding the pictures to Joy, she started typing out the nut graphs of their next story. She included all the information that would go into the second and third paragraphs to explain to the reader why this story was important, along with supply background to refresh memories about the wave of death that was sweeping through the local high school.

  She and Joy would only need to add the lead paragraph from whatever they found at Tim Sheldon's house when they rescued Allie and Janice, and the Chronicle would be able to send out a special online edition.

  Suddenly the force of Jimmy punching his big right foot down as hard as he could on the accelerator, and jumping the car up over a curb slammed Amanda and Joy back in their seats.