ANOTHER KIND OF DIAMOND (26 page)

He did not begin work on Suzan immediately instead he waited for some time during which he watched and listened to every word being said to him by colleagues, searching in their eyes to see who could be hiding something. At last not finding any evidence indicating somebody knows something Gary has been doing but shouldn’t, he decided to go on with his next plan.

As a start, he went and got himself another cell phone in the name of Damian Abrahams. His next move was find him a friend in any guy who lives on the same building as Suzan and that wasn’t so hard for someone like Gary as he soon hooked up with Edmond.

By fraternizing with his new friend, he watched Suzan’s apartment regularly but continued hiding his real motive until one day. Suzan was living for work when he sported her locking the door, so he took to a very strategic position to get a closer look at her and had his eyes filled. At the end, he was convinced she was his lady. In her mid-thirties, not really attractive but could pass by as ok girl. From that moment, Gary picked his next move.

On another occasion, he laid ambush for Suzan at a point from where he tailed her all the way to her job. She worked in a gym as an instructor and for Gary that was a gold mine for his kind of plan.

He then picked the day to go in pursuit, rented yet another car like he’s been doing quite often lately and left for the gym.

Suzy as the girl is called by close friends has walked her present job for years and in the process experienced all sorts of relationships with men that presently she is at a stage where she was considering either trying once more or giving up altogether. But as it turned out, the guy sitting right in front of her right now proved hard to rid of. Something about him seemed so compelling and so forceful that in a matter of minutes into their conversation, she was already considering taking to the later choice. Try again? She focused on this question as Gary flirted- with her.

Gary had introduced himself as Damien Abrahams and later in their conversation gave his phone number. Give me a call, he said before he departed.

Not so decisive about this new guy, several times Suzy tried dialing his number and several times stopped short of actually doing it by good reasons. But then she remembered Wallis. He was not one of those nasty men he got hooked up with from her job because they met on a different arena, on the street. And thinking of what she had with Wallis convinced her that the place of meeting notwithstanding, relationships break and survive. This line of thought added to the strong way she was feeling about Damian but struggling to overcome convinced her to call and she finally did.

He has been expecting the call and happy it finally came through and somewhere in the conversation, Garry asked, when am I gonna see you again?

When do you want to see me again? She retorted.

Babe is up to you. See, I’m ready whenever you want me.

Ok! Where do we start?

I’m thinking a dinner would be fine, what do you say? Suzy thought it over briefly before she gave her consent. And in another week, both ended up on a dining table.

Suzy was anxious to know more about this new man she was beginning to pick special interest on while Gary plotted his own moves. “What kind of job do you do?” She played her card fast and Gary who already worked out every detail on his lines found it easy playing along.

I’m a sales person. I market goods for a North Korean Company, he responded. A little taken aback by that, Suzy responded, I thought North Korea don’t deal with us.

Gary saw this as an opportunity to impress the girl with some of the knowledge he acquired as an Officer in training. You are talking politics here, he began. Babe Politics is different from real life situation. It is just like saying that Russians of the cold war period wouldn’t want to deal with Americans but that’s not the truth. Behind cold war life blossomed between Russian businesses and Americans. People just want a normal life outside of politics. Sensing that Suzy wasn’t showing enough interest on the topic, he diverted immediately. Do you have someone you are seeing now?

No! I don’t! But I used to have somebody!

What was he like?

I’ll rather not talk about that.

Why not? Gary asked, trying so hard to shield his real motive and winning.

Why do you wanna know anyways? She asked looking him straight in the eyes.

I make it a habit to know everything about who I get involved with on this level. Doesn’t that make sense to you? Gary continued.

After a short pause Suzy said. You see it was a strange thing that happened in my life, sometime ago, you won’t believe this but the guy I was dating is the one that was on the news a lot some time ago. Suzy continued.

Let me take a guess. Jack the Ripper! Gary joked.

My God! No way!! Suzy exclaimed. And both of them had a good laugh over that.

You remember the case of the missing couple, Wallis and that girl; I don’t even remember her name, Suzy continued.

Oh! Are you talking about the case of the missing two that happened right here in LA? The story was all over the place. Sure! I remember. Garry affirmed.

I was dating the guy Wallis before this whole shit happened. As she said that, Gary sensed the emotion put to the words.

Really! What a surprise! He responded like it didn’t really matter.

And I don’t believe he is with that girl everyone is thinking he went away with. I think something horrible might have happened to him, continued Suzy.

Is possible they are together since he must have known that girl so well as to be at her birth day party, don’t you agree? Gary tried some psychological manipulation.

No! Wallis had no money. Actually the last time I saw him he was down to his last cent so how could he run off with a girl, Suzy remained on track.

Gary’s mind darted to the safe he found in Wallis’s apartment but he chose to focus in the present. You must know his friends since you guys were really close, right?

Yeah! I know some of them.

Why don’t you talk to them? But you’re his girl and should know more than anybody about his whereabouts.

We never discussed anything about him leaving in a hurry. I’ve also talked to most of his friends since this thing happened and none seem to know anything and that bothers me. Johanna surprised me the most ‘cause he is Wallis’s best friend and I expected to get something from him but no, he doesn’t know a thing. Nothing! Why all these questioning anyways. Are you a cop or something? Actually you look like one to me.

Oh don’t say that! I’m no Police man but let’s say I want to take a clue from your ex and treat you right, what about that?

You don’t have to be someone else to please anybody, Suzy said. But then from the way the conversation was progressing, Gary figured he was digging an empty hole. Suzy won’t lead him to what he is looking for simply because she has no idea on Wallis’s whereabouts. Dinning over and a little talk more, Gary walked Suzy to the car, said good bye and that was the last he ever saw her.

Suzy waited for his call for days but nothing happened, so she made the call but to her amazement the line had been taken off. Well, since no water has passed under the bridge, she thought it was a fair game and moved on with her life.

Thinking about his encounter with Suzy, it occurred to Gary that there is yet another possibility to explore. Isabel had a roommate and he decided to go in search of her in the apartment both girls shared, a place he visited several times during which he got to know Carissa.

In a few days he found his way to 889 Wilkinson Avenue and acting under the cover of darkness as usual sneaked into another building but this time the resident’s list stopped him short. Carissa was no longer listed. That was the moment it occurred to him that he might have acted a little late. Anyway, not knowing what else to do, he packed up his searching kits for now.

Gary might have run around in a wasted effort at finding Isabel but the same could not be said for his colleagues at the Police Department ‘cause all his moves has been recorded on the files of the LAPD and Just like Isabel and Wallis, files, everything is for now cooling off in the achieves of cold cases.

Chapter Fifteen
 

C
arissa has more or less gotten used to her new life with new roommates, an association she is into with mixed feelings. It has been some years now without Isabel and she has been trying hard to cope and doing relatively ok. However, like everyone who had something to do with her former roommate, it does make her feel bad that years have come and gone without a word from the girl she loved like she would a sister and her mind is beginning to wonder in other directions. May be, just may be Isabel is dead. Possibly she saw the fellow that shot Teri and the same bastard killed her. Again she considered going to the Police with this theory simply because she just couldn’t see how Isabel would still be here on earth, well and alive somewhere without relating with her somehow in all these years. But like always she dropped the idea ‘cause somewhere within still resides hope that one day something will lead her to meet Isabel again or at list hear the sound of her voice which is always musical to her ears. But just in case that never happens, so be it.

With her two roommates, is not really bad except for a need to adopt a new kind of life style being forced upon her by the association that makes it hard to decide which way to go jobwise. She did eventually find another sales girl’s job but the pay is nothing to write home about. Seven dollar per hour, ten hours a day in five days is just not enough, she contends so often. Work it out, that makes me approximately one thousand four hundred dollars before tax, she tells who cares to listen. Out of the lump sum, five hundred dollars goes for rent, sixty for cell phone living me just enough for transportation and feeding plus other things a girl must need. At the end of the day my pay check hardly gets me anywhere and with the cost of living soaring each day, I can hardly feed myself talk less savings. I try to get every damned thing I need from some cheap store but even with all their help I still struggle from pay check to pay check. She complains so often that sometimes those around her get irritated and just leave her to be all by herself and this is doing nothing but making her situation even worse.

Truly speaking, in the apartment the three girl’s share, Carissa is the underdog. While the other girls are more than capable of taking care of their end of business, she struggles all the time. Her roommates pay their bills on time and Carissa sees the other girls thriving with lesser hours put to work while she works a full shit yet with much lesser returns. She loves to make the comparison among the three and at the end Carissa is always the loser. Ultimately there is a certain kind of pressure she now feels and is something she knows would not go away as long as she leaves among these two.

What she does is try to avoid the other girls by keeping to herself in her room most times she is home but that is even counterproductive ‘cause the move isolates and keeps her miserably brooding over things. There are times she even considers joining Cindy and Rita in their trade and square up but she also knows it’s going to be a tough decision to make. What that entails is throw away all the instructions she got from her Aunt, turn around and hawk her body for money. Aunt Monica is the only relation she knows of right now and she intends to do all she could to find her and straighten out, but not as a professional hawker. Yet after all said and done, the truth is that Carissa is in such a bad shape financially that she needs urgent solution otherwise happiness will continue to elude her as a young girl. She can’t even bet on it that her Aunt would be bothered about whatever route she takes to making a living ‘cause there are some words from the old lady she still struggles to grapple with. Words like; “Child a woman’s time is very short and is gone before you know it, so make use of it wisely. Exploit the full potentials of your ripe age and you’ll make it” Those were exactly from Monica as she remembers them quite often these days. And relating these words to present circumstances, she felt strongly that may be what her new roommates represent is that kind of chance she needs to seize to make the breakthrough she so desperately yarns! It is a flawed consideration, she knows that, but she holds on, tossing it around.

Still in this mind bugging debate, something else happened to compel her to go that way her heart did not completely approve of.

A fellow sales girl named Stacy always talked about Carissa behind her back and somehow what she says always gets back to her. For a long time she continued to ignore this girl’s silly talks until now because she is always in a bad mood and more sensitive to things happening around her and would snap at every prompting by anyone. However, today, her reaction was a little bit on the wrong side and earned her some consequences.

She was working a very slow shift when another gossip from Stacy came to her through Betty who is always the tale bearer. Carissa! The beach is at it again, Betty started as usual.

And what did she say this time? Carissa reacted swiftly.

She didn’t say it to me though ‘cause she knows what I would have done to her, but someone told me she heard her telling some guy that you look shabby all the time and never have good cloths on. Can you imagine how stupid she is, like she makes more money than you or something! She never ever completes a week’s shift and she has the guts to talk about someone else. I see you work so hard all the time and just because we don’t earn a lot doesn’t mean any of us is lazy or too stupid to check out what’s new in stores. Look at her! There is always something to skip work for! Oh my son is sick. Oh I’ve a Doctor’s appointment and stuff! She’s really out of her mind! She even said you get all your stuff from some cheap store. What about her, eh? What is she gonna do without some cheap store. She has three kids to take care of all by herself and too lazy to do serious stuff. She even said your shoes are all worn out and she is gonna call the makeover guys on you. Can you imagine the bitch!