Waisted

by Randy Susan Meyers

  “So he took you to his office?” Alice asked as Daphne brought out supplies.

  “Yup. I began sobbing. He looked around. I think he was afraid to lose the time with me. ’Cause as he patted my knee, he kept staring here.” She pointed to her buoyant breasts. “He tried to hide it. He’s not a pig.”

  “Finish up, Hania. Bottom line?” Acid churned in Alice’s stomach.

  “He comforted. Then I offered thanks.” Hania shrugged. “Hey, I’m a grown woman. He’s a man. After, he wanted my number.”

  “Tell me you didn’t give it to him!”

  “Do you think I’m stupid?” Hania pouted for a moment. “I told him about my superstrict parents who don’t like non-Indian men. I asked for his number.” She smiled as though waiting for a pat on the shoulder.

  Alice longed for the authority she held at the Cobb. Being the boss was far more her preference than working by committee.

  “And then . . .” Daphne urged.

  “And then I got him to put on music while I gave him a short neck massage. Did I ever tell you guys I put myself through college working as a masseuse?”

  Daphne and Alice both nodded vigorously. “Many times.”

  Alice wondered if they owned any untold stories by this point. The three of them had been one another’s entertainment, support, friends, and in loco parentis for more than three weeks.

  “So, as I dug into his neck, I reached behind for his jeans. When Mike got undressed, the key ring looked like it weighed a ton; I asked him how he carried them around all day. He laughed—truthfully, he thinks this gig is either a weird lark or a sick joke—and said he needed them because in the next few days he’d need to access some out-of-the-way places.”

  “Like where?” Alice asked.

  Hania shrugged. “No idea. But places where the master didn’t work. The master he keeps on a separate chain attached to the whole ring. Or did, I should say.” She held up a key that had been part of a quick-release key chain.

  “And when he misses it?” Alice asked.

  “He’s a careless dude. He’ll chalk it up to it falling off, and tomorrow he’ll search for it. He’s too intimidated by Jeremiah to tell him unless he has to.”

  Alice considered how much to trust Hania’s take. On the one hand, she resembled what her grandmother would call a flibbertigibbet, a word that never failed to crack her up when she went down South for visits. On the other hand, this supposed fluff of a young woman had returned with the goods.

  “Daph?”

  “Project Sleepyhead is done.”

  “How did you do it?” Hania asked.

  “Easy-peasy. I crushed the sleeping pills into a fine powder. Mixed it with water until I had a proper roux, and poured it into that cucumber water everyone guzzles day and night. Jeremiah drinks more than anyone.”

  “What if it tastes weird? Bitter?” Hania asked.

  “I tasted some.” Daphne held up a hand. “Don’t worry! Not to drink. I dipped in a fingertip. The cucumber’s own bitterness covered it up. Everyone is going be sleepy very early.”

  “Okay. The preliminaries are in place. Now we move to part one.” Alice grabbed her watch. “I’m setting this for midnight. Do anything you can to sleep. Use mind over matter. Count sheep or Reese’s Pieces, whatever relaxes you. Because before two o’clock, we’d better be in a goddamn ambulance.”

  CHAPTER 19

  * * *

  ALICE

  At the stroke of midnight, Alice, Hania, and Daphne—a jumpsuited trio of Cinderellas—began their journey home.

  First they repeated their silent trip toward Mike’s office. Alice took no comfort in the sleeping pills Daphne had stirred into the cucumber water, considering it merely extra insurance. The corridors remained quiet, but no more than the previous night. No snores rang out. Alice put her fingers to her lips every few minutes as a reminder to be alert. No tripping on nails as they crept along on naked soles. Not on her watch.

  The master key, tucked into her bra on the underside of her breast (where it would be least likely to show), bit into her flesh.

  Hania turned the knob to Mike’s office. She shook her head at Alice, who dug out the key, and with a prayer, handed over the warm metal.

  Once in the office, they worked fast, sweeping through the room using Alice’s established order. Daphne, the least technical, searched for every possible device and lined them up for Alice. Hania settled in front of the desktop.

  Alice took each laptop and transferred all files related to Waisted to thumb drives swiped from Mike. Hania had been right. Boxes of them were strewn around the office. She would have trashed the files on the computers after copying them, but she feared giving away their theft too soon.

  They finished fast and made it back to their room without a sound coming from anywhere. As soon as they closed the door behind them, they divided the flash drives, hiding them in every fold on their bodies, for once grateful for their fleshy bits and pieces.

  At one in the morning, with the goods hidden, Alice nodded at Daphne and then sat on the closed toilet seat. Daphne laid out her tools and took her cosmetics kit from a bathroom drawer.

  Alice sat, impatient, as Daphne worked her stagecraft magic.

  “Stay still, or I’ll have to do this all over again.” Daphne brushed around Alice’s eyes with feathery strokes.

  “You’re not making the Mona Lisa.” Alice’s heart hammered so furisously that she worried that an actual medical emergency was imminent. There had to be a limit to the number of speed pills of unknown origin a person could take before suffering a stroke or heart attack. Especially when eating became such an afterthought that one lived below subsistence levels.

  Daphne spread cool liquid the consistency of foundation over Alice’s entire face.

  “Are you making me up for prom or disaster?”

  “I need a base,” Daphne said. “Bare skin isn’t the best surface for holding what I’m putting on you. Grip is the key.”

  “Speaking of skin.” Alice tried to frown without moving her face and settled for pointing a finger at herself. “I don’t suppose you have a foundation that actually matches me, do you?”

  “Oh, be quiet,” Hania said. “You should see what she mixed.”

  Alice cut her eyes to the right, trying to see what Hania meant.

  “Stay still!” Daphne warned. “Sorry if I didn’t bring shades of makeup for an entire rainbow of women, but I’ve worked on more than one person of color, for God’s sake. And by the way? We’re not making you up for the Oscars, Halle Berry. I’m mixing in eye shadow to deepen the foundation. If you want the blow by blow, I’ll give it to you. But don’t move.”

  Daphne’s cool fingers soothed Alice as she swept some concoction over her face. “Now I’ll put red on your lower lid.”

  “Weird,” Hania said. “Will it really look like a black eye?”

  “I don’t have my professional blood-and-gore kit, but believe me, I can fake it with anything. You’re going to tear up a bit now. I’m going to add some red to your waterline.”

  “With what?” Alice drew back.

  “A thin brush and red lipstick. Don’t worry. I sanitized it.” She gripped Alice’s chin and tilted it. “After I learned how to fake it in drama club, I used this when I wanted to stay home from school.”

  “Wish I knew you back then,” Hania said.

  “I’m going to outline where the bruise will be.”

  Brushstrokes tickled the skin around Alice’s eyes.

  “Filling it in with red now. Making it splotchy. Adding some purple to the inner lid. And a small amount along your upper lid.” Daphne spoke deliberately as she narrated her work. “I’m putting the purple heavier under the brow bone, where blood collects most. Where that weight supposedly impacted you, it would swell and not color as much, so I leave that area lighter. And yes, I adjusted for your coloring. You’re not very dark, but you’re not pale. When I’m done with the purple, I’ll add more red, because this is a
fresh bruise. When it’s fresh, it’s redder.”

  “Something feels scratchy. What is it?” asked Alice. Staying still was no easy task with the effects of the pills running through her.

  “A sponge. I’m blending in different directions. To make it irregular, the way a bruise forms. Now I’m using a brush again, putting yellow at the bone and covering it with shadow. I make a line with black eyeliner at the corner of your eye, up against the nose, and smudge into the purple. Now, I use creamy eye shadow that I mixed up from different colors and stipple, stipple, stipple.”

  Daphne backed away from her work, tipping Alice’s head this way and that. “I need to do a bit more to make it look like broken blood vessels and make it appear fresher, like a new bruise. A nasty one.”

  She worked in quiet for a few moments. “Okay. Time to build you a hematoma.”

  • • •

  Two in the morning.

  Go time.

  Alice took deep, cleansing breaths, calling up memories of acting in camp plays.

  Daphne held up a bundle of supposed bloody towels. “Done. This is what I’ll press against your head. You gotta clutch these to you. If anyone tries to take over for me, you go crazy. Hold on to Hania with the other hand. Dig in to her arms and scream if they try to separate us.”

  “One more check,” Alice said. “Everyone has their thumb drives, yes?”

  They nodded.

  “Okay. Let’s do this.” Alice, never someone to initiate physical contact outside her family, surprised herself by giving each woman a hug. “Here’s to us.”

  The three walked to the edge of the bedroom and quietly tipped over a dresser. After, they pushed aside the small scatter rug as though someone had slipped on it.

  Hania dragged over a chair and stood on it. Daphne handed her the fifteen-pound weight that Alice had sweet-talked from Jeremiah. Alice and Daphne moved to the other corner of the room.

  “Be careful!” Alice said.

  “Don’t worry, old ladies. Light as the food we eat.” Hania held the iron kettlebell high above her head and threw it to the floor. The weight crashed into the dresser loud enough to wake the entire mansion.

  “Move.” Daphne guided Alice to the spot they planned for her during rehearsal.

  Alice rag-dolled her body, and Daphne moved her into position. Hania knelt like a penitent and pressed the bloody towel into the side of Alice’s face.

  Here goes.

  CHAPTER 20

  * * *

  DAPHNE

  Daphne jumped at Alice’s full-throated scream.

  Despite expecting the sound, a surge of panic rose through her as she raced toward Coleen’s and Valentina’s rooms, first stopping at the bedrooms of the other Waisted members, pounding on their doors.

  “Help!” Daphne sounded breathless and scared. “Help us!”

  Jennifer and Seung stumbled from their respective doors.

  “What? What’s wrong?” Seung asked.

  “Alice.” Daphne panted, her hand flat against her chest. “It’s Alice. She’s injured. Bad. We need help. An ambulance. Wake everyone.”

  With those words, Daphne continued toward the staff rooms. Waking the participants first, she hoped, would increase confusion and concern, adding to the difficulty Valentina and Coleen would have sorting out the situation.

  “Help! Help!” She hammered at Coleen’s door, wanting her to be the initial staff person on the scene. Inciting fear in Coleen would be easier than fooling Valentina, who knew them far better and trusted them far less.

  Coleen opened the door just as Daphne lifted her fist to pummel it once more.

  “What?!”

  Coleen’s soft pink sweats, combined with her sleep-plumped face, offered a more sympathetic appearance than her usual mien.

  “Alice.” Daphne leaned over for a moment, a hand on each thigh, and gasped—true bullshit, as their recent exercise program had so strengthened her. While she was down there, she panted out a slow sentence, as though barely able to speak from fear and being out of breath. “Alice. Weight fell. In room. Unconscious. Ambulance!”

  Coleen ran back into her room and came back with a phone clutched in her hand. “I’m going. Get the others.” She barreled off toward Alice.

  Daphne nodded, running to Valentina’s room until Coleen turned the corner. She counted to ten when she reached Valentina’s and then banged on her door, repeated her story, and went to wake the remaining staff—conveniently forgetting the doctor of the house, hoping the pill-drugged cucumber water combined with Dr. Ash’s usual generous helping of alcohol would slow him down.

  After finishing her rounds, Daphne sprinted back to the bedroom, just behind Jeremiah, the last to arrive.

  “No!” Alice screeched. “No, no, no!” She clutched Hania so close they became an inseparable entity.

  Daphne rushed over. “You’re awake. Thank God. I’m here. You’re fine. Shh, shh,” she crooned like a grandmother.

  “I can’t see!” Alice screamed. “Don’t leave me.” She jerked Daphne down.

  “I’ll take over,” Daphne said to Hania.

  “No!!!” Alice grabbed Daphne’s hand and pulled her close, as planned, ensuring she was surrounded by Hania holding the bloodied cloth to her head and Daphne gripping her hand.

  “She vomited,” Hania said to the room in general. “And blacked out. When she came to, she vomited again. I tried to wipe it away, but if I did, stopping the pressure became impossible, and the bleeding got worse.”

  Daphne inspected Alice, as though checking for danger signs. “She lost control.”

  Jeremiah pushed through everyone to be in front. “What happened? Where’s Ash?”

  Daphne ignored the second question. “She got a weight from somewhere and went insane on doing reps. Don’t know how she fell, but we heard a crash and her scream.”

  “What the fuck?! Where the hell is Ash?” he repeated.

  “I knocked!” Daphne said. “She needs a hospital. Now. We can’t move her without an EMT. If she has a brain injury—”

  “I called,” Coleen said. “They’ll be here soon. Very soon.”

  Alice moaned and then appeared to lose consciousness.

  “Is she dying?” A tear dripped down Hania’s cheek, impressing Daphne no end.

  “Wake up,” Daphne said. “Stay with us!”

  “She’s not going to die,” Jeremiah sounded less sure than his words.

  “I worked in a hospital for years,” Lauretta said. “Plenty of people die from brain hemorrhages. She could be internally bleeding out.”

  Valentina walked toward the three women on the floor. “Let me see what’s going on.”

  “No!” Lauretta stepped in front of the trainer. “You can’t disturb her.”

  “Are you a nurse? A doctor?” Valentina again tried coming closer.

  Susannah and Jennifer blocked her, making a fence of their bodies. “Whoa,” Jennifer said. “This isn’t a game. Don’t touch her.”

  Jeremiah moved forward, stopping when the four women surged toward him.

  “So are you?” Valentina asked Lauretta, even as she stepped back. “A medical person?”

  “I work in administration. I saw more records of how people died than you ever want to see.”

  The sounds of an ambulance broke the country silence.

  “Where’s the weight?” Jeremiah asked.

  “Who cares?” Susannah asked.

  “I think you better leave the scene as it is,” Lauretta said.

  “Are you also the queen of crime scenes?” Valentina again tried to sidle closer to Daphne and the others. “Did you file police reports? Solve murders?”

  Daphne could scarcely breathe between the sour smell of Alice’s vomit—what had she managed to bring up?—and fear.

  Valentina pushed past the women and wedged in closer. She attempted to kneel, covering her mouth against the stench.

  “Get away,” Jennifer said. “I’m warning you.”

  Susa
nnah stepped up next to her. “Or we’ll pull you away.”

  Now the ambulance screamed outside.

  “Coleen. Go let them in.” Jeremiah ran his hand over his head as though clearing cobwebs. Sleeping-pill cobwebs. “Valentina. Move away.”

  Two male EMTs carrying a stretcher came in moments before the doctor.

  “What’s going on?” Ash asked.

  Nobody answered.

  The men, badges sewn on their uniforms, knelt beside Alice, Daphne, and Hania.

  Alice moaned and pulled Daphne closer. “I can’t see. I can’t see.”

  Ash, ridiculous looking in pressed blue pajamas with white piping, tried to fit himself into the picture.

  “Don’t leave. I’ll die. I know it,” Alice whispered.

  “Take us like this,” Hania begged. “She’ll get hysterical if I lift my hand.”

  Daphne gripped the older EMT’s forearm. Success felt so close. His grizzled beard scratched when she placed her lips near his ear and murmured, “We’re in great danger. Take us together, or we’ll die. They’re trying to kill us.”

  He looked up and gazed over the room, taking in the five women in identical pajamas; the three of them in their jumpsuits; the colossal Jeremiah, standing with folded arms; Ash; and the two whippet-thin trainers.

  “No worries,” Jeremiah said. “We can treat her here. We have a doctor on staff.”

  Ash nodded, looking sleepy and dazed, and tried to reach Alice. Jennifer moved in front of him and blocked him from getting closer.

  Daphne whispered once more, her lips pressed close. “They’ve been feeding us pills. Forcing us to exercise around the clock.”

  “We can treat her with our doctor,” Valentina said—so calmly it made Daphne shiver. “Anyway, I think she is high. Probably drunk, yes? Peeing on herself like that.”

  The bearded EMT squared his shoulders and half rose. The deep timbre of his voice quieted the room. “Everyone but these two women, step back.”

  “Now, wait a moment.” Ash slurred as he spoke. “I’m the ranking medical personnel.”

  The older EMT barked, “You heard him. Back up, or the police will be here faster than you can produce your medical diploma.” His thinning hair, sloped shoulders, and potbelly belied the force with which he spoke.