The Water

by Nancy Jackson

  But once inside, the smells, the sights, and the sounds prompted her to do more. Just one drink. She could do that, she was a strong, willful woman. So she would order just one drink. And then with each subsequent drink came further justification.

  Trauma remained from her ordeal last spring, but each week that went by, her resolve weakened. She’d almost convinced herself that she didn’t need to quit drinking; that her assault was not a direct result of her drinking and carousing.

  But in the light of day, she was always faced with the truth. Sadness overwhelmed her. She missed her parents still after all these years. They had been good parents, no — great parents, and there was a huge hole in her life where they had been.

  The pain had been so intense after losing them she had walled herself off in order to feel nothing at all. And that is what pushed away the most wonderful man she had ever known. She had been engaged to be married when she received the news of her parents’ accident.

  The relationship had only lasted two months after that. No one was equipped to suffer the abuse she had dished out. She had finally convinced him she didn’t love him anymore. And she was right, she had hardened herself to the point where she felt nothing, not even love.

  So why did she drink if she felt nothing? Because the truth was she did feel and each day it was getting increasingly difficult to avoid the reality of old emotions begging for reconciliation.

  Buzzzz. Buzzzz. She looked over at her phone buzzing on the nightstand and limply retrieved it. Laying back against her headboard, she looked at the name of the caller. It was Mike.

  “Hey there,” Carrie greeted Mike.

  “Hey yourself. You okay? You don’t sound like yourself.”

  Carrie was tired of the flirtatious banter she and Mike constantly engaged in. “I’m fine. Just woke up.”

  She flung her legs over the side of the bed and sat with her arms on her thighs; the knobby points of her elbows wobbled to find purchase.

  Suddenly all business, Mike began, “Sylvia found dozens of missing persons that could be Cami. None of them had a name even close. Honestly, she may not even be from here.”

  “True. Facial recognition might help, but I doubt she’s in the system, and even if she is, it will take time. I don’t want this poor girl’s murder to be another one that goes unsolved.”

  “I know.” And Mike did know. They had too little to go on and so little time to get everything done that they needed to do.

  “What’s on the agenda for today?” asked Carrie.

  “One reason I called is that the autopsy is scheduled for two today.”

  “Ok, I’ll be there,” said Carrie. “Were you guys able to find that Gus guy? Did he come to Pride’s to get Jenny’s money last night?”

  “No. We hung back and tried to not give ourselves away, but he’s on to us. My guess is he made plans to pick it up somewhere else.”

  “I want to coral this guy and interview him. I want to know if he is the one who did this,” said Carrie. “We need to find him.”

  “We have to be careful though so that Jenny and Pride don’t feel backlash from it,” said Mike.

  “True, but they are much stronger than you realize from living in that world each day.” Carrie knew that the life of a prostitute was not an easy one and that those girls grew up quick in order to survive.

  “I’ll see you at the autopsy then?” asked Mike.

  “Yep, I’ll be there,” replied Carrie. Her voice was tired and weak for so early in the morning.

  “Are you sure you are okay?”

  Carrie sat on the edge of the bed staring at the floor. The high whine of a rogue mosquito next to her ear didn’t even cause her move to swat at it. “I’m fine. Just tired.”

  “Well okay,” Mike responded, then almost as an afterthought, “You know Carrie, we’ve been more than colleagues; we’ve been friends. Yes, a little more than friends with all the flirting and all, but I’m here for you. I do care for you and I want you to know you can come to me with no strings attached whenever you need to talk.” Mike finally stopped talking as though he’d hit a wall, not knowing what else to say. He wasn’t good at this sort of thing, but hoped that Carrie could sense his sincerity.

  “I know Mike and I appreciate it.” And she truly did. Mike was comfortable, like an old familiar part of your life you knew was there should you ever need it. But she was tired of the shallow flirtatious game they’d been playing over the years, and yet, she knew she didn’t want more from Mike.

  These last four months since the attack had caused personal reflection on her life, and she didn’t like what she saw. For the first time in a very long time she was forced to take a long hard look at herself, and with that came the awareness of just how desperately damaged she was.

  Pain swallowed her and sucked her strength. But even so, she pulled the energy from somewhere deep inside to get up from the bed and shuffle to the shower.

  The hot water felt like tiny hot needles on her face and the steam enveloped her completely. She let the pain from the hot water consume her and she held her face firmly towards it.

  Where had her resolve gone? Soon after the attack she had such firm resolve to change, to turn her life around. She had wanted to and knew she could.

  Her workout routines had not only resumed with a vengeance once her wounds had healed, but she had approached them with a fervor unlike anything she had ever done before. She was soon working out at least two hours, sometimes more a day, every day.

  But that didn’t help what was still inside, and soon the struggle to keep from sliding back into her old life overwhelmed her. It was easy at first to resist. She had felt so good physically that her confidence was high.

  But work locked her into an old familiar routine: long hours, poor eating habits, anger towards perpetrators, and the resignation that nothing ever really changes. So, hope slowly faded a little more each day.

  The buzzing of her phone once again brought her back to the present day, so she shut the shower off and grabbed a towel.

  “Yep,” she greeted Randy.

  “G’morning,” said Randy.

  “You sound perky.”

  “I am. And I’m not sure why. Just feel good this morning,” said Randy.

  Carrie wondered what was up with him. He’d been in a perpetual bad mood for months.

  “Things going better with you and Sandy?” asked Carrie as she slid on her bra and buckled it. She’d long since learned she could multi-task with the phone on speaker.

  “Well…,” Randy hedged. “We talked when she got home last night. She went to that place, but was only gone for a couple of hours, so I was relieved.”

  “So you are okay with her doing that now?”

  “I wouldn’t say that, but when we sat there talking, and I saw her eyes light up, I felt so guilty for not wanting her to be involved. I realized I was trying to take away something she loved doing, something that gave her purpose.

  “I still don’t like it and I’m still aware that she is inserting herself into a dangerous situation, but I have to let her do it because I love her. It felt good to let some anger go.”

  Grabbing her gun and badge, Carrie looked around the room to double-check she had everything. A smell caused her nose to wrinkle. She had to clean up her house and take out the trash soon. Life didn’t stop because she was in a funk.

  “That’s good. I’m headed out the door now. Mike called and said autopsy is at two this afternoon. Also, that Gus didn’t show at Pride’s last night.”

  “Hmmm. That’s interesting. He’s either avoiding Pride’s because he knows her place is being watched, or he’s gone. Or something,” mused Randy. “I’ll see you at the office in a bit.”

  “Ok.” The phone went silent and Carrie cranked up the radio. She tried to sing along to the old 80s tunes, but she just didn’t feel it.

  “Did you see Gus last night?” Pride asked Jenny. Jenny’s face showed little improvement from the day before. The g
irl had just shuffled into the kitchen where Pride was making coffee.

  “Yeah. He met me at my first stop.” Jenny fell into the wobbly kitchen chair. The torn vinyl pinched her thigh, so she shifted to avoid it.

  Pride poured a cup of coffee and sat it down in front of Jenny, then turned to pour herself one. “Are those new bruises on your arm?” Pride asked.

  Jenny squirmed and pulled her thin robe up to cover herself better.

  “He hurt you didn’t he?”

  Jenny nodded. “He’s crazy mad about Cami. He didn’t like her, but he’s mad she’s dead. He thinks, well knows, we talked to the police.” Jenny raised the steaming cup of black coffee to her mouth and gently blew the black brew.

  They sat quietly sipping their coffee. Pride sat wondering who killed Cami and what to do. “I made a phone call yesterday.” Pride was hedging her words. She didn’t want Jenny to panic and not hear her out.

  Jenny looked up over her cup and waited for Pride to continue. “There’s a place that tries to help girls, well boys too, to get them out of prostitution and trafficking.”

  Jenny slowly sat her cup back on the table. Her mind was suddenly flooded with so many conflicting thoughts and emotions that she couldn’t sort them out. It was true she’d told Pride yesterday she’d wanted out. But how did she dare hope she could be free from all of this?

  When Jenny didn’t respond, Pride continued, “You know that I don’t normally trust those who haven’t lived in our world, cops and such, but I have to believe that there are good people out there. Sometimes you just have to take a chance.”

  Pride reached across the table and laid her hand on Jenny’s. Finally, Jenny looked up from her cup to Pride’s face and slowly nodded. “I don’t have the strength to fight Gus. He’ll kill me. He may have been the one who killed Cami.”

  A frown creased Pride’s brow. “Why would you say that?”

  “Pride, he’s crazy. I know I said he’s crazy mad about Cami, but that was for more reasons than one. She kept bucking him and going against him. Knowing Gus, he killed her and now is blaming her for making him do it!”

  Jenny looked back down at her chipped cup. Her focus blurred and she no longer saw the cup at all, but the night before when Gus had grabbed her and shook her arm with such fury that she thought he would break it.

  She had given him the money, which was never enough, and then he had started in about them talking to the cops. “He’s convinced that we had the cops waiting for him last night when he should’ve come here to get his money. I told him they came by, and yes they may have been around, but that it wasn’t our fault.”

  Jenny reached in her robe pocket for her cigarette pack, shook out a cigarette, and searched for her lighter. Where had she laid it now, she wondered? She didn’t feel like she had the energy to search for it, but her need for nicotine was greater.

  While Jenny was on the hunt for her lighter, Pride rose to cook breakfast for the two of them. She knew Jenny would try and refuse to eat, but she had to get her to, somehow.

  The smell of bacon sizzling in the pan reached Jenny’s nose in the bedroom. It smelled good, maybe she would eat. She wasn’t sure when the last time she ate was.

  Finding her lighter on the floor next to her bed, she bent over and picked it up. Waves of dizziness washed over her and she thought she might be sick again. When she shut her eyes, pinpricks of light shot behind her eyelids.

  She sat on the edge of her bed to attempt to regain her bearings. Tears slid down her face once again as she thought of Cami, then Pride’s voice rang through the house. “Jenny come eat breakfast. I insist.”

  Jenny took a deep breath and stood. She knew she needed to find some resolve deep within herself not only to survive, but to overcome. She had no idea how to do that, but for Cami’s sake, she would try.

  “The bacon smells good.” Jenny looked at Pride with gratitude from her downcast eyes. Then she smiled a weak smile and Pride pulled her in to a tight embrace.

  “I love ya girl. We’ll get through this somehow, some way.” Then patting her back, she released Jenny. “Here. The first step is to eat and try to gain some of your strength back. Then, we’ll talk and come up with a plan.” Pride loved Jenny as if she were her own daughter and her smile revealed it.

  Jenny laid her lighter on the table and picked up her fork.

  Sandy was back at work in her kindergarten classroom, but all she could think about was the night before at Safe At Last.

  The three girls were so young, and it gripped her heart. One was only twelve! That was just four years older than her own daughter.

  Her lack of training had relegated her to menial tasks such as showing the girls where everything was, helping with dinner, and just being there with them for company. But she didn’t care. In fact, she had loved it.

  Fear had only gripped her stomach afterwards when she pulled into her own driveway, concerned about what Randy would say. She didn’t want another fight.

  But when she walked in at nine, he looked surprised and relieved. He must have expected her to have been home much later.

  It put him in a good mood and she had felt safe to talk to him more about her desire to get trained and to continue volunteering there.

  He was skeptical, but agreed to help more with the kids when he could.

  Last spring they had separated. She had been convinced she wanted a divorce. The constant fighting was more than she could take and she had made him move out.

  There was only one drawback. She loved him. Since he was home so little, the kids missed him; and she wanted to make it work somehow.

  A friend from school had invited her to go to church with them. She was entirely resistant to it. The little denominational church she had attended from time to time while growing up, held no appeal to her, and she was still trying to shake guilt that had wormed its way into her soul.

  Finally though, she had reluctantly given in. It had been nice, and the kids liked it. But she still just had not bought into it all. She continued to go because the kids begged her to each week.

  But then she had met Beth and heard about Safe At Last. Her heart came alive as she listened to Beth talk about the horror of human trafficking and how prevalent it was.

  Then she had expressed an interest to Beth in helping. Beth had just looked at her for a moment and then simply said, “Well, just pray about it.”

  Pray about it? That had taken Sandy back. Why, she wasn’t sure. Maybe it was because she didn’t know how to pray, but maybe more so, why to pray. Either you wanted to do something and did it or you didn’t. What did prayer have to do with it, she wondered.

  She had only nodded in agreement to Beth. If she were honest with herself, she felt like an imposter at church, but she kept going for the kids' sake. And if she admitted it to herself, it was growing on her too, just a bit.

  Chapter 5

  “Can we narrow down the missing persons’ list that Sylvia gave us?” asked Carrie.

  Randy was shaking his head at the large number of girls they had to sift through. “Maybe if we tighten the description down. Did she have any distinguishing marks on her like moles or tattoos?”

  Carrie looked through the thin file they had so far. “Nothing yet. We need to talk to Pride and Jenny again to get more specifics on her. Hopefully, they are over the shock and can think of things they hadn’t before.”

  “We have the autopsy at two this afternoon, that may give us something there. If we can identify this girl, then we may find this was personal,” said Randy.

  “It was personal even if it was just directed at her personally as a prostitute,” said Carrie.

  “Has forensics turned up anything at all from the crime scene?” asked Randy.

  “There was so much to sift through that it will take a while.”

  “We’ve got time to go back to Pride’s before we head on over to the coroner’s office,” said Randy glancing at his watch.

  Carrie nodded and gathered togeth
er the file she’d been reviewing.

  The hot August sun assaulted them as they stepped from the shadow of the OSBI building. Carrie had remembered not only her sunglasses this time but also her cap.

  The fabric seats seared the backs of her arms as they hit the seat. When Randy cranked the engine, she pressed the down button on her window. She was trying to break her old habit of fiddling with the temp control as soon as he started the vehicle. Thinking of all their banter back and forth regarding that very thing, she chuckled.

  Randy looked over at her as he was pulling out of the parking lot. “What’s so funny?” He asked.

  “I’m trying to break some old habits, so instead of cranking the AC when you started the car I rolled the window down. I just thought of all the fighting we’ve done over those controls all these years.” She continued to look out the front window, but had a huge grin on her face. “You didn’t even notice.”

  Randy’s eyebrow rose as he thought about what she had said. “I would have said something. You need to roll that window up now though, the AC is cooling off.”

  “Never content, are we?” Carrie asked. She was joking and Randy knew it. She was incredibly comfortable around Randy. He truly was her best friend. But there was still a hole in her heart she thought may never be filled.

  As they drove through the congested city streets towards Pride’s house, Carrie looked out at all the people and wondered where they were going and what their lives were like. Were they happy, she wondered, or numb and just going through the motions like she was?

  Fifteen minutes later, they were pulling up to Pride’s house. The neighborhood appeared quiet. The front door opened soon after Randy knocked. It was Jenny who’d answered.

  Jenny’s stomach knotted immediately when she saw the cops standing on her front porch. Pride had gone to the grocery store and Jenny was home alone.

  “Can we come in and talk to you Jenny?” asked Carrie.