Free Fall (25 page)

"Don’t forget that it was my bodies’ decision to drop an egg when medical science told it not to."

"Yes, indeed. The stars were aligned perfectly."

"Cosmic." Nina smiled.

"Destiny." Joseph smiled back.

"Seriously, Joseph. I think I conceived right before you left to go back to LA. How cool is that?"

"That," Joseph said, taking her into his arms, "is cooler than shit!"

"What are you smiling at?" Trish asked as Nina came around behind the bar.

Nina came back down to earth and shrugged enigmatically.

"Cut it out, will ya? I can’t stand all that happiness in my face today." Trish said with a scowl.

"What’s up your butt?" Nina asked cheerfully.

"I got a call from Lamont today and he wants me to fly down to LA and take that cruise to Puerto Vallarta."

"That’s great! What’s wrong with that?"

"Well," Trish hesitated. "I’ve seen him a few times since. He's been coming up here to visit me."

"What?" Nina said. "Why didn’t you tell me?"

"Well, I didn’t want to take anything away from your big moment. And then you kept on having big moments and I just wanted you to… have those moments."

Nina put her arm around her shoulders and pulled her close. "My beautiful sister," she whispered, her eyes watery. "Thank you! But why is this making you so cranky?"

Trish hastily stepped away. "Don’t make me cry!" She carefully used her fingers to wipe under her eyes and expertly avoided smudging her eyeliner. "I'm" she paused. "I think I’m in love."

Nina threw back her head and laughed out loud. She raised both arms towards the ceiling and cried out, "Hallelujah!"

"Shhh! Shut up!" Trish grabbed her arm and led her back to the kitchen.

"Sorry," Nina said. "I’m just so incredibly happy for you. We’re on the same page now! We've come full circle. It’s fantastic! We’re living the dream, baby!" She went in for a hug and awkwardly pressed her friend against her pregnant belly.

"I don’t like it," Trish said. "I feel all anxious and insecure. I’m worried—
me
actually worried—if he feels the same way."

"It had to happen sooner or later. Remember all the conversations we had about Joseph and the conversation we had at his house the day before we went to the party?"

Trish nodded.

"So, you know what I’m going to say, right?"

Another miserable nod from Trish.

"I say take your own advice and go for it! Take it! Grab it! Get it before you lose the chance. Take the risk!" Nina looked her straight in the eye. "And no matter what happens, come hell or high water, I will be there for you. You will always, and I mean always, have me. I am your friend for life."

Trish finally smiled. "Thank you, Nina. That means a lot to me. I feel the same way about you. I guess I will let it ride out and give it my best shot. I'll call him back and say that I’m going. Don’t worry, I'll be back in time for your party. I wouldn’t miss that for anything. Can I invite him to come?"

"Of course you can. I would like that very much. We’ll get him fine and fully acclimated to Seattle, won’t we?"

Trish smiled bigger. "Yeah, he won’t know what hit him!"

Karen awoke in her car and looked at her watch. It was six thirty. She needed to get back down to Seattle so she could get into the club before it got too crowded. She searched her purse for her cell phone. She knew that she shouldn’t use it, shouldn’t have even brought it. She, like anyone else over the age of fourteen, knew that cell phones have GPS and can ping off cell phone towers to show the location of any phone. But, they were going to know that she'd been in Seattle anyway, and she planned on destroying the phone without using it again. First, she just wanted to look at her messages.

There were three voice mails from her sister. The first one was placed while she'd been at home. The other two were when she was on the road coming to Seattle. She listened to the messages, her lip curling at the sound of her sister’s voice.

"Karen, mom is in the hospital. You need to call me back immediately."

Then: "Karen! Mom has had a major stroke and is in California Hospital’s intensive care. You need to come down here now!"

And finally: "Karen. Where are you? There’s no easy way to say this in a voice mail, so I’ll just say it. Mom passed away at ten o’clock from an aneurysm in her brain. I’m making arrangements for her body. I need you. Please, call me back as soon as you get this."

Holy shit! Karen sat for a minute and then got out of the car. She removed the back of the phone, took the battery and the SD card out, and stomped on the phone several times. Then she picked up the pieces and threw them and the battery in a trash can. She tucked the tiny SD card into a sleeve in her wallet and thought about the death of her mother.

Oh well, she mentally shrugged. Probably died from a result of the fifty thousand gallons of booze she had swilled down before she got sober. Too bad, so sad. Actually this unexpected event was a plus in her favor.

She got into a suitcase and zipped open a pocket on the side. She pulled out a switchblade knife with a four inch blade and put into her front jeans pocket. She'd found the knife while going through her sister’s duffel bag looking for drugs, hoping to find a reason to kick her sister out. When she'd found the knife she'd kept it for her own protection. Never could know what some junkie might do. Sneak up on her in her sleep. Get so high she wouldn’t know what she was doing.

She'd also found an old pocketbook in her sister’s things. In it were several pieces of personal information. That's when the idea had sprung to life in Karen’s mind, though she never thought that she would be utilizing it so soon. She took the old driver’s license of her sister’s, her social security card and her birth certificate. Thankfully, there was no indication of multiple births on the certificate. The photo on the driver’s license was before Karla took her downward slide into drug addiction, so she looked reasonably healthy. It was no trouble at all for Karen to pass herself off as the Karla in the picture. The department of licensing took a new photo of Karen for a passport/enhanced driver’s license under the name Karla Eve Wassenbaum. With the passport in her possession she was able to obtain a copy of Karla’s social security card, making sure to check the mail each day until it arrived. Her sister, who had so unexpectedly remained clean, had obviously had no more use for the knife because she didn't notice it was missing. The other documents she simply returned to Karla’s pocketbook after she was finished stealing her identity.

She opened another zipper pocket to be sure she still had the half-filled bottle of Rohypnol from the Las Vegas incident. Next, she took out a pink tank top with sparkling gold edging around the sexy low cut neckline, swiftly put it on and zipped her coat over it. She locked the car and got back on the bus to downtown. In her seat she applied some makeup using her compact mirror, and then got off at the same place as before. She walked the four blocks to the Live Wire.

As she approached the club she saw that people were already standing in line to enter. A bouncer in the doorway was using a metal detector and checking people’s bags. Damn! She walked away and around a corner into an alley looking for a place where she could stash the knife. Two homeless looking men were standing, heads together, beside a dumpster. Karen watched them for a moment and realized a drug deal was in progress. Inspiration struck. She got out her money and separated eight twenties from the wad. The homeless men had spotted her and were turning away to evade exposure.

Karen thought quickly. Before they could get away she went over to the dumpster and carelessly asked, "Do you know where I can get some H?"

The taller one, whose face was so thin and pointy it looked deformed, looked her up and down suspiciously. He stroked a scraggly looking goatee. "The fuck you talking about?" He said aggressively. "We're just standing here minding our own business."

Obviously taken by Karen’s appearance the other man smiled at her, showing grossly rotten teeth. "Whatcha got goin on tonight, girl? Wanna party?"

"My friends are inside the club," Karen gestured towards the street. "I’m just looking for a little extra um… perspective tonight while we watch the show." She doubted these guys would be going into the club or even be allowed inside.

Hatchet face backed away a few steps, turned and left the alley.

"You a cop?" The guy with the shitty mouth said. "You don’t look like no hype, with your shiny hair and all."

Hype? Karen realized the guy meant junkie. "No, I’m not a cop." Karen knew from working on The Edge that a lot of people thought if they asked this question the alleged cop had to tell the truth or it became entrapment. This was just not true. Cops could lie and entrap any ole way they pleased. This guy was stupid, she decided and the thought made her bolder. "So yeah, I’m new. You got some tar for me and my friends?"

"Come party with me," Shit Mouth said. "You don’t wanna be nodding in there. I got a safe place by the overpass."

Never in your wildest dreams. Karen hid her revulsion and smiled her best smile right back at him. "Well, maybe if you’re around in a couple of hours we could meet up."

"Okay, then. Back here, say ten o’clock?" He inspected her legs and winked. "I bet you got some fine wheels under those jeans, dontcha? I’ll save myself for ya, wouldn’t want to be too high before we get high would I?"

I’m in a badly written scene out of a B movie, Karen thought. "Sure, ten o’clock, I’ll be right here."

"So, how much you need?"

"Three bags?"

He held out his hand and three small black encased balloons appeared in his palm. "One fifty."

Karen was sure that was too much, but slipped the folded twenties to him anyway. "I don’t have change, so here’s one sixty."

"Well, you'll get the change when we meet back here. Maybe I’ll give you more than the change too!"

Karen laughed as she put the bags into her pocket next to the knife. "Oh, we’ll see about that!" And thanks for ripping me off, she said to herself. "Hey? Do you have an extra syringe?"

"Woman, you are new aren’t you?" He dug into his coat and handed her a small needle. "Brand new, never been used. Got it at the needle exchange."

Whoopee do for you. "Thanks so much. I’ll see you later."

Out on the street she made sure the man wasn't following her. She slipped the knife, the syringe and the bags of heroin into her makeup bag. Just down the street from the club she dropped the makeup bag into a trash can next to an empty bus shelter. The trash can was full, so it wouldn’t be a problem fishing it out again. She just had to take the chance that no one would look into the can long enough to see it.

She took off her coat and stood in line to get into the Live Wire. The big guy at the door accepted her sisters ID without question and did an indifferent sweep up and down her body with the metal detector.

"Open up your bag, please." The man said. Karen held open her purse and the man told her to move things around inside so he could get a better look.

"Okay, have a good night." Then Karen was inside.

Behind the bar on the right stood that woman, hugely fat and smiling like she didn’t have a care in the world. The place was swarming with people, four feet deep at the bar, so the cow was too busy to notice her. Karen stood frozen in place, all the anger and frustration, the humiliation, the
injustice
of it all threatening to overwhelm her. This bitch, this fat assed loser had ruined her life. She wanted to smash her smiling mouth in. She couldn’t see Joseph anywhere, so she moved to the other side of the bar and stopped again when she saw that there were no empty tables whatsoever. She couldn’t keep standing around and call attention to herself so she backtracked and went up to the first table she saw that had an available seat. Three guys were sitting there. A nice looking older man with salt and pepper hair and two younger guys that looked like they could be his sons.

"Excuse me," Karen said prettily. "But is this seat taken? I was supposed to meet someone here, but I think I’ve been stood up."

"Of course!" The older gentlemen actually got up and moved to an outside chair so Karen could slide onto the bench seat in the corner next to the other guy who grinned at her in a friendly way.

Karen settled in, putting her coat and purse at her side and realized with a rush of feeling that her power had returned. Even without blonde hair! Men! They were all the same. She was hidden in the corner, but with a great view of the entire bar.

"Why don’t you guys let me buy a round of drinks," she said, and flagged a passing waitress.

"Sure, you can," said the guy next to her, "as long as you let me get the next one."

"Sounds like a plan. My name is Karla."

Introductions were passed around and casual chit chat ensued. ‘Karla’ was here from California taking care of her aging mother who had just had a stroke. Karla didn’t know a lot people in Seattle and after weeks of staying inside with her mother, she felt like she had to get out of the house and have some fun. She had made an online date with a guy that was supposed to meet her here at the club.