Disclaimers: This story contains offense language, characters who are morally ambiguous and deals with dark themes and graphic violence. You've been duly warned so don't complain if this isn't your proverbial “cup of tea”. The characters in the following story are of my own creation. Any similarities to anyone living or dead are purely coincidental. No part of this story may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission from me, the author. This is an alternative fiction. Any comments can be sent to me at bironel@gmail.com
Synopsis: An urban tale of Karima Jenkins, a female ex-criminal who clashes with her tenant Sienna Joffe, a dedicated public school teacher who is instrumental in helping Karima to resist the “pull” of Sincere, a man who has returned from the dead to reclaim his most treasured acolyte, Karima.
Many Thanks: To H. Yoakam who helped me with this story way back in 07 and Lee Fitzsimmons who stepped in and being immensely helpful with sound advice and editing.
The Chapter Opening Quotes: At the start of each chapter are what I call “borrowed seeds” which sprang from essays, performances, novels, TV shows, films and songs I've bumped into along the journey of the characters of DITP. These “borrowed seeds” inspired the weaving of this story. However, I don't own them, only borrowed them and have tried to concisely give an accounting of their original source(s). If your curiosity has been provoked, I encourage you to explore them at your leisure.
Unfortunately there can be no doubt that man is, on the whole, less good than he imagines himself or wants to be. Everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is.
-Carl Jung, Psychology and Religion
“Um...” Hack said. He swallowed. “Isn't this kind of... illegal?”
“He wants to know if it's illegal,” then John said, amused. “You're a funny guy, Hack. Yes, it's illegal, killing people without their consent, that's very illegal.”
Vice-President John said, “But the question is: what does it cost us? Even if we get found out, we burn a few million on legal fees, we get fined a few million more... bottom-line, we're still way out in front.”
Hack had a question he very much didn't want to ask. “So... this contract... what does it say I'll do?”
“We've explained our business plan. What we want you to do is… Execute it,” Vice-President John said.
-Max Barry, Jennifer Government
It was the consistent beep of the heart rate monitor that foiled Sienna's numerous attempts at sleeping. At least that was what she told herself. Although her room was sufficiently dark enough for sleeping, she fretfully tossed and turned in the hard bed unable to find a comfortable position to rest.
Her face hurt. Her neck hurt. Her side hurt. Her knee burned incessantly. Her soul hurt. She desperately needed rest to heal properly. She needed to rest but she had no need for dreams. She wished for a dreamless night. But she knew the dream would come. She amended her self-assessment. Perhaps it was the fear of that dream that kept her awake. In the light of new information about herself and her small world, Sienna had been amending her strongly held beliefs all night. Knowing now her world existed on an uncertain, shaky, violent, and cruel foundation.
How can anyone relax when there is no safe place? Perhaps that's why I can't sleep , she thought. I used to know the dangers of the world through the safe distance of newspapers, TV sound bites and idle gossip. The horror always out there somewhere. Far away. Never touching me . I want my delusions back! She lamented silently. Shivering, she wrapped her body in the paper-thin blankets on her hospital bed to shield her from the frost of uncertainly and fear.
So cold. It had to be the cold , she thought that was keeping her awake. She realized the cold was more than the cold air sweeping into her room from the sterile dimly lit hallway. The coldness was also beneath her skin as the chilled saline and sugar nutrient solution dripped into the IV skillfully inserted and clumsily taped to her arm.
Sienna wanted to focus on how cold she felt, wondering if there were various degrees of coldness. She needed to maintain this mental exercise but her tired mind drifted to the reflected lights that moved across her ceiling. She stared at them as they drifted across the ceiling. These were the reflected headlights of the traffic on the street below that filtered through the Venetian blinds covering the large window beside her hospital bed. They traveled along the ceiling in a repeating pattern, a comforting repetition of light.
Sienna knew that the ambulance took her quickly to the nearest hospital, which was a public city hospital ten blocks away from the subway station and twelve blocks away from her loft apartment. But she didn't want to go home just yet. The traffic on the street outside her hospital room suggested that regardless of what happened her life just went on as though nothing significant had happened tonight.
Feeling empty, Sienna continued watching the reflected light travel across her ceiling. She wondered briefly where all the people were going so late at night. It was the repeating patterned of those car headlights that pushed her to recall the light of the train against the tiled wall as it exploded into the subway station. Sienna grimaced, her fists tightened as she tried not to recall what she had witnessed.
— — —
She saw through her profound sense of shock and a thick curtain of tears, Kalid stumblingly on uncooperative legs into the incoming train. Her eyes widened in horror as she saw his body stuck then dragged along the edge of the subway platform. His face contorted in horror and shock as he slowly turned his head towards her, bewildered. His wide dark eyes searched hers as he reached out his free hand towards her. The word ‘help' seemed stuck in his throat, but screamed out loud with his eyes. She could only shut hers as more tears flowed. As though the act of closing her eyes shut out the horror of what she had seen.
Behind her eyelids, Sienna recalled more than she ever wanted. How Kalid jumped up and ran away. How surprised she was to see two blight bursts of fire silently shoot from her savior's clenched fist. Was she some sort of alien or a goddess? Sienna pondered. Who had power like that? Her mind wondered as it slowly tried to make sense of what she was seeing and not seeing.
As time jumped forward, editing in her mind, Sienna saw the small explosions of blood from Kalid's quickly retreating calves. Saw him stumble like a puppet with cut strings forward once again. Saw HER pick up pieces of metal that scattered along the platform. Hearing the sounds of Kalid and the train colliding, then feeling it. Saw the cold determination on HER face. Hearing the sounds of an alarm alerting her that help was on the way. After they locked eyes once more, Sienna's eyes begging her to stay, Karima's eyes concerned then unreadable. Empty soulless looks of perhaps regret. Hearing sirens but seeing HER walking away as though nothing happened. That hurt.
— — —
It wasn't the sound of the alarm that brought Sienna back into the cold, dimly lit hospital room from her haunting memories. It was the light from the corridor spilling into through the open door and the presence of night duty nurse Hyacinth Watson, a large, mature Jamaican woman with an infectious smile who came in to check up on Sienna.
“How we doing tonight darling?” Nurse Watson inquired.
Her patient was non-responsive, watching her in the darken room with hooded eyes. The nurse smiled sympathetically at her charge. She knew all the medical details that this woman was attacked. A ragged, split lower lip, which was skillfully sutured by Oren, that gentle med student with those soft nimble hands who wanted to be a surgeon. Nurse Watson knew that in time there wouldn't even be a scar on her patient's lower lip. She knew Oren would have a bright future in any surgical subspecialty service. Unlike that other disaster, Medical Student Trevor on duty in the ER whose bedside manner would be more useful in the forensic lab. She hoped his mentor would steer him away from Obstetrics and towards Pathology for the sake of future mothers everywhere. She sucked her teeth at the lousy way he taped the IV to this particular patient's arm. She checked the IV drip which was administered in the ER
Nurse Watson planned to retaped the IV more comfortably for the patient after the antibiotic was finished. She continued to take a visual accounting of her patient's condition. A black left eye, which would also heal in due course. Ribs bruised but thankfully not cracked though still very painful. Dark marks around the troubled woman's neck. Her patient's worse conditions consisted of acute stress disorder and her severe concussion when she was first admitted into the hospital. A deeply religious woman, Nurse Watson thought it was by the Lord's Grace this sad woman wasn't actually raped.
Hyacinth checked the various monitors connected to Sienna quickly finding the culprit of the alarm - in tightening her fists Sienna dislodged the pulse oximeter which was monitoring Sienna's blood oxygen level. Hyacinth placed it back over Sienna's fingertip and reset the monitor with two quick button pushes. She noted that her patient's mood still seemed a bit disoriented and depressed. She recorded the observed data onto Sienna's bed chart.
Hyacinth noticed that her patient was shivering, so she offered, “How about I get you another blanket, okay darling?” The night nurse didn't wait for a reply as she turned and left Sienna's room, humming a favorite hymn. Moments later, Nurse Watson returned and placed delightfully warm blankets over Sienna. Surprised by the warmth from the blankets, Sienna looked up into Hyacinth's smile.
“I thought I'd grab a few, hot from the warming cabinet. Try to get some rest, darling.” Nurse Watson added with a wink before she left to check on the rest of her charges on the ward for the duration of her shift.
Things were looking bleak , Sienna thought, angrily wiping tears off her cheek. Sienna watched as the nurse left her alone again, in the darken room. She cried silently because of the unexpected kindness. She didn't realize just how brutal and cruel life really was until this evening. She didn't realize how alone she felt until… until her enigmatic savior left her alone to wait for the authorities while Kalid moaned in agony, dying as he was trapped between the platform and the train car.
How could she have just left me? Alone? Sienna wondered for the hundredth time. Sienna realized that her deductions about her building manager were totally off the mark. She wasn't a cop. Otherwise she would have stuck around.
She is a murderer. A murderer that saved my life . Perhaps that was why she didn't tell the police anything about her. Sienna allowed them to incorrectly assume that her savior was a man. No one seemed to listen to the dying boy who when his found voice ranted about a big black beast.
— — —
Sienna drifted off for an hour before a nursing aide came into her room with another admitted patient on a gurney. Sienna was very cranky. Nurse Watson left her alone an hour ago after she checked Sienna head to toe checking her pupils for reaction, checking hand and feet for movement and strength. If Sienna had to answer anymore questions about what time of day it was or where she was for that matter she was going to scream!
She looked over at the new patient was an overweight elderly Black woman groaning and moaning. Her complaints became more vocal when the orderly moved her from the gurney to the bed.
“Hurts!” The elderly woman groaned.
“We have to wait until the tests come back before the Attending can manage your pain relief, Mrs. Jacob. They explained that to you downstairs before you were admitted.” Nurse Watson replied from the open doorway. She knew from the notes on the patient's intake info taken in the ER that the elderly patient came in complaining of a sore back after she fell. It might be a legitimate injury but Nurse Watson was diligent in her surveillance of patients who wanted free city hospital drugs. Since the public hospital had a policy of taking pain complaints from the elderly very seriously, poor elderly patients with substance abuse issues tended to try and scam the system to score some drugs. If the pain complaints of this patient were bogus the city police would have to step in. Nurse Watson wasn't having any foolishness on her watch.
“You have a roommate so try to keep it down until your tests come back, Mrs. Jacob.” Nurse Watson recommended. “You two can keep each other company during your stay with us.”
“They told me in the ER that I wouldn't be here for too long. How soon can I leave?” Sienna asked the gentle nurse.
“You want to leave us so soon? If everything looks okay your doctor may let you go later this afternoon.” Nurse Watson replied.
The elderly woman settled down to a low moan as she hunched over into a large ball facing the windows and rocked in her bed. Sienna sympathized with the senior citizen as she felt the pain and fatigue of the night's events wearing down on her entire body and drifted into a light sleep.
As dawn came, Sienna woke from her fretful nap when she heard muffled sounds and hushed voices just outside her hospital room. The corridor light shone brightly into the room. She looked at the open doorway ruefully. She began to regret allowing the ER staff to admit her after they assessed her physical condition. She should have called Troy or Lizz and stayed with one of them instead, then maybe she'd actually get some sleep.
She looked over to her elderly roommate's bed and noticed it was empty. Must be in the bathroom , Sienna concluded.
Sienna watched wide-eyed as she saw someone large and dark dash past the open doorway of her hospital room. Soon after, two burly muscular orderlies ran past clearly chasing the other person. There was bedlam in the hospital corridor Sienna heard angry, frustrated voices barking out orders.
“I'm not having this nonsense on my shift! Stop this foolishness at once!”
“Someone call security!”
“You should have secured the patient to the bed!”
“I got you! I got you! You old bat!”
Sienna jumped as she heard a loud crash somewhere close in the corridor.
“Ow! She bit me!”
Incredibly, Sienna then witnessed the same burly orderlies running in the opposite direction as though their lives depended on it. One was holding tightly onto his arm as he ran and was soon followed by hospital security guards. Sienna saw her soon to be former hospital roommate, the elderly woman, chasing the orderlies and hospital security swinging an IV stand overhead like a club!
With all the activity on the ward floor all night there was no way she was going to get any substantial rest in this hospital, Sienna concluded. She considered getting out of her bed to see what exactly was going on out in the hallway, but she decided to grab the old fashion landline phone off the table next to her bed, feeling its heft and clutching it close to her chest. She had enough of being a victim for one night. If that manic senior citizen came back into the room with any intentions of hitting her with the IV stand, Sienna was going to fight back!
A distant door alarm sounded and Sienna overheard whisperer and grumbling about drug scammers and escaping patients running down the hospital corridors from the annoyed nursing staff.
The gang must be wondering where I am , Sienna thought as she recalled that Troy , Helen and Lizz wouldn't know what had happened to her. Sienna reached behind her bed for the large blue bag that contained all her possessions. She searched the contents for her cell phone and was disappointed to discover that it's battery had run out of energy.
She felt grimy and wanted desperately to take a hot shower and disappear under the covers of her bed for a month or two. Whatever happened, it's too bad the ambulance didn't take her to the private city hospital , Beth Israel that was over twenty-five miles away, Sienna mused as she hugged her blue bag tightly, turning over on her side to lie back down and stare out the window.
— — —
Sienna slowly walked down the long hallway, past the nurse's station towards the bank of phones in the visitor's waiting room. She had been out of bed for most of the afternoon, eager to leave the confines of the hospital. She wasn't able to make any outgoing calls on the phone in her hospital room and her cell phone was dead.
— — —
Five flights above her hospital room, in the ICU of the city hospital, the nursing staff worked diligently to monitor Kalid, handcuffed to his bed, keeping him alive and relatively pain free, but they wouldn't be disappointed if the boy didn't make it considering he was arrested for attempted rape and assault.
A large Korean patrolman was stationed outside Kalid's room. Two detectives assigned to the case greeted Officer Kyeong as they walked up to the door. Officer Kyeong hadn't been at the crime scene but he had heard the gruesome details.
Detective Harper, a redheaded attractive married woman and mother, was an eleven-year veteran on the city police force. She wore a gray gabardine pants suit and a royal blue blouse she gotten on sale when she went shopping with her two teenaged daughters. Her partner Detective Richardson a hardnosed twenty plus years veteran who lived, ate and drank his job twenty-four hours a day. followed her. His loosened necktie was spotted with stains that looked like he had spilled some of his professional life on it.
The two detectives entered Kalid's room, they found him heavily sedated. Both of his wrists were handcuffed to the bedframe. Detective Richardson grimaced as he noticed the stitched lacerations all over his face, neck and torso. Thick bandages hid fat angry abrasions snaking around his neck and up onto his head.
“He had so many internal injuries we had to induce a coma,” said Kalid's surgeon, Dr. Epel as he entered the room behind them. A nurse had alerted him that the detectives had arrived. He wanted to deal with them and their questions as quickly as possible so that he could concentrate on more important duties.
“When do you think we will be able to question him?” Detective Harper asked. She cringed inside realizing how stupid the question was considering the state the boy was in. He was missing the bottom half of his body- the lower half. Nobody would want to wake up to that reality , she concluded.
“There was significant brain swelling which we were able to relieve. If he makes it he faces many more months to years of physical and mental rehabilitation to regain the ability to walk, read, write and speak easily. It's a guessing game if he will ever fully recover.” Dr. Epel replied.
Detective Harper took out her notebook and pen while Detective Richardson scowled at the doctor.
“There was extensive spinal cord injury. Internal cuts and burns over a tenth of his body. Worst was the damage to his lower limbs.” Dr. Epel revealed. He pulled the drapes surrounding Kalid's bed close giving them all some privacy. He walked next to Kalid's bed and pulled back the bed coverings to reveal the bandages around the end of a thigh stump and the boy's pelvis.
“During the surgery, we were forced to amputate the right leg above the knee and the left leg was amputated at the hip as a result of bone, nerve, and tissue damage that could not be repaired. The left sciatic nerve was obliterated,” Dr. Epel rattled off the various issues he spent over eight hours fixing. He doubted this kid would make it.
“Sciatic nerve?” Detective Harper wondered aloud.
“The sciatic nerve is a large nerve fiber that begins in the lower back and runs through the lower limb. It supplies nerve sensory function to nearly the whole of the skin of the leg, the muscles of the back of the thigh, the arteries of the leg and those of the leg and foot.” Dr. Epel lectured using himself as a model.
While he spoke Dr. Epel noticed the two detectives staring at his patient's permanent erection. He explained the condition to them, “ There was extensive damage to the patient's sacral plexus. The priaprsim you see is due to that damage. So far treatment has been unsuccessful in returning it to a flaccid state. There is a high probability we will have to amputate.”
“Amputate?” Detective Richardson barked.
“The patient's prognosis isn't favorable. Impotence is highly likely. We have to prepare for the possibility of gangrene,” explained Dr. Epel.
What a waste! Detective Richardson thought as he once again took note of how young the boy was. He vowed to himself to get to the bottom of whatever happened on that subway platform.
“Were you able to collect any physical evidence of the patient being shot at the crime scene during surgery?” Detective Harper asked after a quick glance at her notes.
“The impact of the train crushing and burning his legs destroyed any physical evidence of the gunshot wounds." Dr. Epel responded.
“Thanks Doc.” Detective Richardson offered dismissing the Doctor. He had suspicions he needed to voice with his partner. “No bullet fragments. No spent cartridges. Doesn't it seem fishy that we can't confirm that this kid was shot at all?”
“But the alleged rapist made a statement about a black guy with a gun according to patrolmen on the scene. The victim didn't see the gun but saw the flashes from what had to be the muzzle.” Detective Harper recalled from the crime scene notes.
“Besides what could have caused the kid to stumble off balance like that? According to the layout of the subway platform he had ample room to sprint away. There was nothing underfoot for him to trip towards the oncoming train. You ask me the kid is lucky he survived.” Detective Harper offered.
The two detectives left ICU walking towards the bank of elevators, planning to speak with the victim who was admitted to the same hospital.
Once inside the elevator going down, Detective Richardson retorted, “Some luck. The kid will be an impotent cripple for the rest of his life.”
“Those are the potential risks when you attempt to rape. Not every victim is just gonna take it.” Detective Harper quipped.
“We're on the same page. I wanna speak with this attempted rape victim too. She's holding something back.” Detective Richardson revealed.
— — —
It was late in the afternoon when Sienna was just coming out of the bathroom to relieve her frantic bladder and freshening up a bit while she waited for the doctor to sign her discharge papers. As she stepped back into her adjoining her hospital room, she noticed a professional looking slightly balding man and woman waiting for her beside her bed. The red headed woman was her height but was heavier. The man was a few feet taller.
“I didn't see anything except the other patient chasing the hospital security. We didn't speak to each other.” Sienna said. She realized that they were probably checking up on the melee from this morning on the hospital ward. She thought it best to dive right in with her statement about the elderly patient who had caused such a ruckus before disappearing from the hospital.
Escaped is more apt , Sienna mused as she wished she could disappear as well.
“Ms. Joffe? My name is Detective Harper this is my partner Detective Richardson. We are here about your assault in the subway station last night.” Detective Harper explained as she handed Sienna her business card. Sienna looked at it carefully, studying it as though for a moment she didn't know what the female detective was talking about, then she looked up at the stern professional face of Detective Richardson. Sienna quickly darted her eyes back at Detective Harper's face that wore a mask that suggested sympathy.
“We wanted to speak with you about any information you may remember about the person who stopped the kid who you claim tried to attack you,” continued Detective Harper. She looked back at her partner's stony gaze then suggested, “If you prefer you can speak privately with me.”
“Kalid assaulted me!” Sienna spoke with more anger than she realized she held. Why else would I be in a hospital? As much as I'd like to hide at home, I need evidence and unfortunately I'm the evidence! Sienna thought hotly.
“This Kalid kid is one of your students isn't he? You haven't had an inappropriate personal history with this student have you?” asked Detective Richardson. “Lately it seems very vogue for mature female teachers to be intimately involved with their underage male students.” He accused.
“ I have been at my current job as a high school teacher for a few years and no student until Kalid forcibly “inquired” if I liked it up the ass. So far in my career I was pretty damn okay with that!” Sienna hissed with hot tears.
“Just covering all the bases.” the insensitive Detective replied. He noted how defensive the woman got when pressed ignoring the emotional outburst.
Detective Harper shot her partner a stare and he stepped away allowing her to handle the questions. She found him to be frustrating when they worked together on sexual assault cases. He was more suspicious of the victims than the assailants. She realized sometimes his suspicions were warranted but she had a feeling this case was a genuine assault. The black eye and strangle marks on the woman's neck sealed it for her. She had a hunch that this Kalid kid had a previous criminal record.
Students don't just go crazy one day with murderous intentions without a history of such actions. It doesn't matter what conspiracy theories abound concerning Columbine. Detective Harper thought. Once they finished speaking with Ms. Joffe she decided the next stop would be for them to go to the school, which was the link between these two to confirm if there was any problem between teacher and student.
“We really don't want to antagonize you, we wanted to know what else you remembered about the person you said stopped the boy from attacking you. Can you remember anything about him?” Detective Harper asked.
Detective Richardson moved closer to the victim asking, “How tall was he?”
“Tall.” Sienna spoke quietly.
“How tall?” Detective Richardson asked.
Sienna looked at him. She knew that her building manager was at least a foot taller that this stern, annoying detective. “Taller. A foot taller than you I think.” Sienna replied.
“Can you remember what he looked like? Did he have facial hair? Clean-shaven? What was he wearing?” Detective Richardson fired off impatiently.
“I don't remember what he looked like, just really tall,” Sienna replied meekly.
“Did he say anything to you?” Detective Harper inquired.
“No.” Sienna lied. She wondered why she was covering up for a noisy and dangerous woman who left saved her then abandoned her to wait alone for help to come.
“Then how did you know he was there to help you? Could the two of them have been working together?” asked Detective Richardson.
“They didn't act as though they knew each other,” Sienna spoke quietly.
“Was the man who allegedly helped you black? We have a statement from the patrolmen who first arrived on the scene, the assailant, a Kalid Muldrow, spoke about a black beast?” Detective Richardson asked. He was impatient with Harper's slow and plodding tactics. There was a dangerous man out there shooting people and Detective Richardson was determined that he was going to be the one who took him down.
“Yes.”
“What did the gun look like?” asked Detective Richardson.
Sienna stare mutely into space for a moment trying to recall just up to the point where she saw Kalid being crushed by the train. She closed her eyes tight, her memories going farther than she wanted to recall.
“I didn't see the gun. I saw flashes of light.”
“Did you hear the shots?” Detective Harper asked.
“I only heard the train coming. I didn't hear any gun shots.”
Exhausted by all the questions and fearful that she'd slip up and reveal information she didn't want to reveal, Sienna sat down on her bed in a slump. She was tired of all the questions. Her body was heavy with unwanted memories. She wanted to leave this place and sleep dreamless dreams.
Detective Harper took note of the fatigue on the victim, and halted her questions.
“Well we don't have anymore questions right now. If you remember anything call us.” Detective Harper offered as she pointed to the card she handed Sienna earlier. Detective Richardson shot her an angry look. He had more questions. She dismissed his silent argument and turned to leave Sienna's room. He reluctantly followed her to the elevator bank.
In silence they descended in the elevator.
Once inside the unmarked car, Detective Richardson exploded, “I thought we both agreed that she was withholding information?”
“She can't remember anything useful. Besides she was shutting down.” The detective replied as she fastened her seat belt.
“We've got nothing! No witnesses to the shooting except the alleged victim and a comatose kid. No weapon. No clear description of the so-called Good Samaritan. No concrete evidence! The kid didn't get a chance to rape her so there is no rape evidence.” Detective Richardson complained.
“If she fought back his DNA is all over her. That smart women allowed herself to be admitted to the hospital immediately after the attack. And we do have an important descriptor.” Detective Harper replied.
“We've got nothing but a “she-said he-can't-say ‘cause he's in a coma” case. The assistant DA is gonna love this one.” Detective Richardson groaned.
“Shots seen but not heard. Interesting no? These garden variety thugs ‘out and about' don't invest in an instrument like that. They are all about the noise. They make songs about the sounds of guns. ‘See me, fear me! Respect my illegally enforced authority!' They are attention whores but not our subway hero here. Our subway hero boy is a shy one. Why did he disappear before the cops got there? The train destroyed any evidence of gunplay. He could have persuaded the woman not to speak about the gun. He just saved her from a fate worse than death. He would have made a splash in the newspaper. Think of the headlines ‘Subway hero saves woman from rape!' The major and the commissioner probably would have had a photo op with the guy. Stuff like this is catnip to the male ego. So why “book out” on a heroic scene? These facts my friend suggests a professional hitter. We've got a six-foot plus tall black male vigilante with a silencer on a gun. ” Said Detective Harper revealing her conclusions.
“So we're looking for a black male hitter? Who employs someone with those credentials?” Detective Richardson asked as he pushed the ignition button and the hybrid car silently came alive.
“I have some connects with the Lui crime family. I'll dig there first to see what comes up. The school interviews first then we're off to Flushing ,” Detective Harper commanded.
— — —
It was well past 10 PM in the evening when Sienna finally made it home to her loft apartment. As the taxi pulled up to her building, she handed the taxi driver the travel voucher she received from the hospital discharge duty officer.
She alighted from the cab and watched as the driver pulled away from the curb. She continued watching until the taxi disappeared with a right turn. Sienna looked around noticing that she was the only living soul on the entire city block. Empty of sound lit by street lamps, thick with potential danger and alone on the city street she felt vulnerable and exposed.
Holding her breath, she rushed to open the front door of the building with her keys, only releasing her breath when she closed the front door of the building behind her. She walked to the elevator and pushed the button. She heard a soft bell ring when the elevator car appeared at the lobby level opening its doors. Sienna stepped in noting that her versatile building manger had installed a security camera in the elevator. She wondered briefly if her building manager and savior was watching her at that particular moment. She fought the impulse to give the camera lens the proverbial finger when the elevator arrived at her floor and its doors opened.
Sienna heard the soft sound of jazz music flowing into the hallway from the loft unit at the opposite end of the hallway from her loft apartment. It was coming from the apartment where SHE lived. Not wanting to run into the noisy mysterious woman who managed the building and saved her life last night, Sienna made quick work of opening the locks to her apartment door and slipped into her apartment, locking the door behind her.
She looked around the vast space relived to be home. In one single breath she slipped down the closed door to the floor, her back hard against the locked door. Angry fear shook her body and squeezed tears from her eyes. She cried like children do when they make some insignificant mistake that rocks their entire world. Arms wrapped tight around her knees Sienna cried for all things she knew she lost last night. Her sense of safety and her bravado bolstered by her unshakable belief in herself. It was all gone and nothing had come to replace it. It was in observance of its absence that the biggest tears fell.
— — —
Her long legs stretched out along her shiny parquet floors, Karima sat on her couch/futon bed in her living room listening to jazz music, sipping an ice-cold hard cider. Staring at her unfinished brick wall behind her Ikea Lack entertainment center and bookcase, she sighed. She stared at the rows and rows of books on the shelves searching for unspoken questions to answers in the various colors of book spines lined up on each shelf. She stared as though she saw something there, something unrecognizable, something familiar yet strange.
Karima closed her eyes when she realized the unrecognizable was in fact herself. She couldn't name what it was about herself that she couldn't recognize and so she continued sipping, listening and staring.
Although she was loathe to dull her senses, on occasion she used intoxicants to free up her tightly controlled analytical mind to free up her more creative aspects.
After twenty minutes of being in the throes of inertia, Karima stood from her long held perch annoyed at the uncertainty of it all. Uncertainly was formless and uncontrolled. And she didn't like it one bit. Mostly the feeling she had that something else was just outside of her vision bothered her. Something cold and dark. A potentially ugly disaster. Something dangerous. Upon deep reflection, Karima realized she first felt this unease most strongly in the subway, during the assault on her tenant Ms. Joffe and much stronger after.
Karima searched her mind for some descriptive morsel to have shed light in the darkness of her disturbance. As she drained the hard cider from the long brown glass bottle, she heard the unmistakable sounds of her only tenant letting herself into her apartment unit. That loft unit was some forty yards from Karima's apartment yet she heard no sensed the diminutive troublesome woman's presence. Then it dawned on Karima! Another presence was in the subway! Some silent specter was seeing everything .
Sincere! Karima deduced with trepidation. But he couldn't have survived. And even if he did he'd be. Unless he is training someone new, then he could be formidable , Karima concluded.
So Sincere is back , she surmised. The certainty of it calmed her. The veil of uncertainty she felt earlier fell away as Karima remembered the moment in time that was the true catalyst in her estrangement with Sincere.
— — —
Her eyes opened to darkness. Her pupils adjusted to various degrees of dark due to a sliver of light entering into the space where Karima found herself. She was lying on her back, prone. The light was coming from near her feet. Assessing her physical state her right hand was useless. Her head throbbed. Her legs were numb having fallen asleep. It was the pain in her ribs when she coughed that shot through her wooziness.
Pain was good. It lets you know you are still alive, s he thought. Through the pain she remembered Sincere's teachings “To survive anything you gotta know this truth deep in your gut. There is nobody out there to help you. There only targets, those employed by the targets to stop you and the rest that will only get in your fucking way. There is no one out there on your side. Whether you're trapped, starving, cold… Never forget no matter the pain you feel there is only one thing you can depend on... There's far worst shit coming around the corner.”
She shifted her weight on her right hip needing the pain to reawaken her. Sleep was a hunger that appeared frequently in her mind. But she didn't have the luxury of rest. She couldn't afford it when all her resources needed to be spent on surviving. She didn't even have the excess needed for revenge even though she was due it. She needed to survive and that was it. In moving her battered body she realized she was confined in a tight room so the first priority was to escape. Surviving would have to tag along.
Damn how long have I been in here? Karima wondered. Then she wondered where here was or rather what here was. She pushed out with her good hand, the left one. Earlier, Sincere had smashed a mallet into her right one crushing many of its small adroit bones, causing insult to its tendons. Her shooting hand. She would have to retrain herself to shoot left handed if she ever survived. When I survive , she amended with determination. She slowly reached around discovering the violent limitation of her new space.
A box, she concluded. Only Sincere would appreciate this dark joke she smirked morosely. Sincere told her time and time again that boxes meant death, whether they be literal boxes like this coffin Sincere threw her unconscious body into or those figurative boxes of the mind categorizing everything and limiting forward movement.
Karima would give anything to have handled her recent disagreement with Sincere over a contract a bit differently considering where she ended up. She was determined not to die in this box so she had to figure a way out of it and be prepared for Sincere to have some deathtrap waiting upon her escape.
She closed her eyes tight both to ride the pain shooting through her head and to remember all the events that happened before she awoke in a box.
— — —
As Karima predicted the contract soured over the course of five hours, after George “Tiny” Mancinelli was executed. The three families went to bloody war. When the dust settled, Sincere had a score to settle with Karima and he decided to use Karima's estranged mother to do it.
Karima prepared for Sincere to retaliate but he disappeared until two weeks after the Pabons no longer existed, the Mancinellis were a distant memory, the only Espinosas that survived lived for years in Israel , and Karima's twenty-first birthday came around. Unexpectantly, Sincere gave Karima's mother a gift for Karima insisting that she give it to her personally.
“What you want Sincere?” Moms inquired. She hadn't expected to see the street hustler since he stole her only child away so many years ago. He was lurking in the hallway near her apartment when she went out to empty the garbage at the incinerator. Upon seeing him, she briefly entertained the thought that he was in the hood to get back with her running mate Joan, but she recalled their hot and heavy situation cooled years ago. Joan was currently juggling three married men , Karima's mother recalled. She fixed him with a hard stare. He fidgeted as he stood outside her apartment door.
“I gotta get out of town kinda quick but I wanted to get this to Karima. Our girl's a woman now.” Sincere spoke nervously as he handed a wrapped gift box to Karima's mom.
“If you want her to have it you shoulda given it to her your damn self! I ain't one of your errand boys!” Moms exclaimed pushing the package away.
Karima's Mother hated that her only child was turned into a soulless thug by the cocky street hustler and many times ranted that it probably would have been better if Karima got knocked up with a kid like so many of the other girls her age in the hood did. She didn't know the details of what Karima did for Sincere but she had suspicions as she watched her curious bright daughter turn into a humorless, cold wraith.
Back in the box, Karima smirked how feisty her mother was and probably still is through her missing tooth and metallic tasting liquid in her mouth as she recalled the heated argument with her mother years ago that ended when she slapped Karima across the face for disrespecting her authority in her home. At fifteen, Karima left her mother's apartment never to return.
Karima recalled how her mother described her last meeting with Sincere:
“You and Kee Kee gotta bury all this hostility Ma! You'd be proud of how she done turned out. Real proud. Look I got all this heavy stuff coming down on me that I don't want around Kee Kee but I want her to get this. I'ma be gone for a spell but I don't want baby girl to think I just up and abandoned her. Seen?” Sincere pleaded.
“I ain't holding no drugs in my home!” Moms threatened.
“Now you know I kept baby girl away from that shit. Why you gonna play me about like that? This here celebrates the woman she done become right before my eyes.” Sincere explained as he gestured with the gift box in hand.
“Sincere, I ain't gonna be part of some game you running!” Moms shouted.
“Shit done popped off all over town and I ain't gonna leave my girl without, so make sure she gets this and give it to her yourself ‘cause you bitches hold grudges too fucking long if you ask me!” Sincere barks as he shoves the gift into Moms hands then walks away.
Truth is Moms and me ain't talked for a long stretch - like a five year stretch so she wasn't gonna do anything that Sincere asked , Karima smirked remembering. Moms closed the door and immediately opened my gift. She told me it was a set of silver automatic pistols. Moms called Joan over to do what we women do in the face of the intangible - discuss the shit out of it. After many cocktails and a decent shared joint Moms and Joan decided that they both would deliver my gift to me.
Joan drove my mother to one of the few places I frequented and they found me five days after my birthday on a free Thursday night at the monolithic museum of art nestled in my favorite section, the European section of swords and armor in the west wing. I could sit for hours imagining how to use each instrument of death with unerring accuracy. The hilt of every broad sword seemed familiar, my hands flexing in hidden memories.
Call me shocked when my irate mother interrupted my reverie , Karima recalled
“I been looking for your narrow behind all the damn day like I ain't got better things to do! What the hell is going on with you and Sincere, Kee Kee?” my mother assaulted me with her loud boldness bouncing off the marble museum walls.
I cringed. I detested that stupid nickname more than I hated folks shouting at me.
“Me and Sin are at an end.” I revealed quietly wondering why she tracked me down. If she was gonna use stupid nicknames I'd use the one I had for Sincere. Considering all the shit he taught me to do Sin was the best name for him.
“Well I don't appreciate him leaving your junk all up in my home.”
“What you yelling for? You shouldn't have accepted whatever Sin gave you. If I was you I woulda just tossed it.” I suggested. I wasn't in the mood to be yelled at all night. In fact I'm never in the mood for it.
“He said it was a gift.”
“Gift? What is it?” I asked knowing full well she probably opened it to see what it was. Then to my horror I asked quickly, “Where is this gift?”
“They search your bags to get inside this place and I ain't gonna get caught with those things. Joan got it in the car.” Moms explained in a more civil and quieter tone.
My curiosity as to what the gift contained disappeared in a loud fiery explosion on the street outside. It was so powerful the windows facing the blast zone shattered on all three levels of the museum and the force knocked both my mother and me off our feet.
Many hours later when the museum was finally evacuated we both discovered as we reached outside that among the debris, police and emergency crews, was the charred frame of the car Joan was waiting in with my gift.
Sincere threw down the gauntlet that afternoon. He was willing to kill my mama. He made it personal between us and as I looked at the fat tears of fear and shame in my mother's eyes I knew that the distance between us would never be crossed by words. Because of me her best friend in the world, the woman she knew when she was five years old was murdered , Karima remembered.
Since the news reported that the explosion was a foiled terrorist plot with only one causality, the terrorist Joan. Joan's murder would never get justice. As much as I loathed personal vendettas it was up to me to get justice for her. Karima decided.
— — —
One month after Joan's funeral, it wasn't difficult for Karima to track Sincere down. He had tried to disappear in another city finding quick working in its underground economy managing a car theft racket. Since Sincere didn't have any personal relationships to exploit Karima hit him where it would hurt him the most–his work. She found and torched the three chop shops he ran to ship stolen luxury cars to Western and Southern Africa . In one night Sincere's new inventory, over three million dollars in value, was lost. Since Sincere was working under someone, that someone wasn't pleased to a violent extent. Karima knew that Sincere would be too busy protecting himself from his new bosses to worry about her gunning for him.
What she didn't consider was that he was waiting for her to come to him. He delighted in the ingenious way she let him know she was on his trail. She cornered him in a chop shop hidden under an interstate highway. It was there Sincere got the drop on her during their fight with a mallet. Can you believe that shit? A fucking mallet , Karima thought as her right hand left the world of pain to the vistas of numbness.
— — —
She smelled the scent of fresh cut wood and her left index finger caught on a splinter as she searched her wooden prison. When she couldn't find a seam or opening in the wooden box that contained her, Karima tried to quiet her breathing to listen. Her ears picked up many sounds but it was the music outside the box that was loudest. She heard distant music, not the melody nor the lyrics but the booming bass of a powerful subwoofer.
Feeling the beat of the bass she shifted her weight onto her left hip, kicking at the side of the box with the bass beat. Her breath was labored, more blood spilled into her mouth, but she didn't let up kicking at the side of the box that contained her. She became the bass beat, kick for kick until she heard the characteristic sound of wood cracking from the strain.
She was surprised when her right foot kicked a decent sized hole in the left side of the box and more dim light spilled in temporarily blinding her fully dilated pupils. She stopped and listened to hear if her work attracted any attention. She strained to listen hearing nothing but the distant bass beat. She continued her escape artist work until the side of the box collapsed from the strain, falling away and down to the floor after a considerable length of time with a crash. Shit! The ground is really far away from this fucking box! She thought as the box began to sway. Karima grunted in pain when her body rolled involuntarily toward the new opening in the three-sided box.
At the last minute she grabbed the edge of the box as her heavy body slipped out the swinging box. She quickly found herself dangling from the suspended box in what seemed to be a deserted theatrical backstage of an auditorium. Her left shoulder burned with pain as she realized that she torn some tendons in her rotator cuff in her desperate attempt not to fall to the ground that seemed to be forty feet away from where she was hanging by one arm.
I gotta stop eating those fried foods. My ass is getting too heavy for this shit , Karima moaned silently as her left arm protested under the strain. Gotta get to the floor, find any weapon I can use and get the hell outta here, she decided.
The drop to the floor would have been a piece of cake if she had the use of both of her hands for a proper tuck and roll. Also the cracked ribs made tucking the least desirable of acts in Karima estimates. The box swayed back and forth Karima hoped that the ropes suspending the box didn't break. She strained her neck to see above the box, taking note that it was tied off from some sort of metal catwalk.
Can't get down might as well go up. Keep it moving girl we ain't dying in this shit hole! Karima told herself as she slowly, carefully climbed on top of the box to reach the ropes holding it up in mid air.
Using the ropes Karima inched up the rope stopping every so often to rest and to check to see if any potentially life-threatening attention was brought to her activities. While the climb up wasn't easy by any means the fact that she wasn't being guarded or watched didn't seem quite right to her. She had to be prepared for anything that could pop off.
Damn I need a weapon , she groaned.
When she reached the catwalk, there was one final pull over the huge lights anchored along the side of the railing. She quickly dropped to her stomach when she heard the sound of bullets ricocheting about her head. She listened and heard footsteps coming towards her. She grabbed and pulled the electrical cord wrapped and that hung on the railing. When the person who had shot at her got closer she threw the heavy cord at him surprising him. She quickly pushed a long swing pipe of heavy lights at him knocking him off his feet and over the railing tangled in the electric cord. Karima grabbed for the prize–a submachine IMI Uzi with a suppressor on it. Karima was surprised it didn't misfire when he dropped it.
She allowed her left hand ten seconds to get acquainted with the weight of the weapon before she moved with deadly action. She rolled over on her back pointing the gun left handed at the next person who advanced towards her. The first ten shots went far off target. She grimaced then found her target with a quick adjustment in the man's open angry mouth. He was instantly stopped in his tracks when the trail of bullets exited out of a large hole in the back of his head. This shooting continued until Karima spent almost all her ammo and six men were dead. The gunfight wasn't exactly a fair one Karima had a submachine gun weapon which was good in close up disagreements. The dead men had sniper rifles good only at a distance. The one still dangling from the electric cord was still struggling to free himself.
She turned onto her stomach when she heard loud clapping. Her eyes darted around unable to find the location of whoever was clapping.
“Did you know these smucks thought you'd die in that box? I told them Baby Girl is hard to kill. She's even more fun to watch.” Sincere spoke over a PA system.
“Personally I thought you would drop to the floor. I had men targeting the floor under the box with sniper scopes, by the way. I didn't think you'd climb up. Didn't see that coming. That's creative.” He went on to say.
Karima kept low crawling along the metal walkway staying in the dark. She didn't have the liberty of taking wild shots in the dark while he apparently could see her every move. She had to get the hell out of this place and fast, she thought as she crawled away.
“Now that's not polite Kee Kee. Leaving before the party gets started. You never leave when the music is still playing,” Sincere teased as he flipped a series of switches, which turned on all the lights and blasted the music that Karima heard when she was in the box.
I'll use the music to my advantage , she thought.
The man dangling by the electrical cord jumped as his body smoked and caught on fire. Using the electrocuted man as a distraction, Sincere snuck out from the enclosed operations platform room and silently advanced on Karima's position. When he reached where she was laying down concealing her body from the overhead lights, Sincere whispered loud enough for her to hear him, “How's that right hand?”
He shot at her body emptying his clip into her. When he finished he kicked hard at her body making sure she was dead. His surprise that he shot at one of his dead goons wasn't as shocking as when he realized too late that she stood behind him with the Uzi aimed at his back.
“Sayonara Sincere, that's Japanese you know. Now don't go confusing it with cyanide, which is, probably, goodbye in any language,” Karima spoke mixing up a quote from a comedy film from the ‘50s she saw a while back on TV and liked. She thought she needed a quirky statement before she ended her mentor's life, just to trump that sarcastic inquiry about her good shooting hand. That mallet thing really pissed her off.
A picosecond later she shot Sincere several times in the center of his back, aiming for his heart and lungs. The force of the blast knocked him off his feet and over the railing to the floor below. Karima heard the loud crash of his body when it hit the floor. Funny thing was when Karima hobbled over to see where his body fell, his body was gone. A blood trail from a thick dark pool of the thick stuff was present, but no body.
No one could survive that amount of blood loss , Karima thought. It was a riddle Karima left unsolved as she escaped into the night.
— — —
Pulled back to the present, Karima took out another hard cider from the nearly empty fridge contemplating a sleepless night as she planned how to smoke Sincere out into the open.
— — —
It was four o'clock in the morning and Sienna took the last of five long hot showers scrubbing her skin and scalp until her hair squeaked like glass when the water rinsed through it. She stepped out of the shower and into a thick, fluffy towel. She caught her reflection in the mirror-taking note of the bruises around her right eye and the dark marks around her neck.
She briskly dried her hair and walked over to her cell phone, which she had plugged in to charge the long dead battery. She turned on her cell phone, which came alive with lights and sounds. After it connected to the network, it revealed that she had ten voice messages. She dialed her voice message box and listened to all her messages:
Voice Message #1 9:55 PM from Troy Lui : “Dude where are you? It's ten o'clock. If you're up in here and we musta missed you. Text me.” Troy commanded before she ended the call.
Voice Message #2 11:09 PM from Troy Lui : “Girl where are you? Lizz is off her ass crazy drunk. Her two exes are here. And get this; they're dating each other! Can you believe that shit? Personally I think they hooked up just to mess with Lizz's head. Where the fuck are you?” Troy barked. “Hit me on the cell.” She ends the call.
Text Message #1 12:15 AM from Helen Mills-Lui : “Sienna it's Helen. Troy finally told me about Peggy's husband. I'm getting worried. Once we sober up Lizz we're swinging by your place. Call either one of us. Please.”
Voice Message #3 1:20 AM from Troy Lui : “Yo Sienna! We've been at your apartment building for like an hour! There ain't any body in your building to let us in! Where the hell are you? Listen Lizz threw up in my jeep! That shit ain't cool.” Troy complained. “I hear you baby but she gotta know that shit is all her fault!” Troy explained to her irate beloved. “Sienna your phone musta died or something cause we left you three messages. Call me or Helen back soon before we call the cops on your ass.”
Voice Message #4 1:28 AM from Peggy Unman : “I'm thinking of another naked scrabble weekend and I have two luscious new friends that can't wait to play with you. Kisses sweet ass.” Peggy cooed seductively before ending her call.
Voice Message #5 2:12 AM from unlisted number : “You're with my wife aren't you, you fucking dyke! Yeah I got your number in more ways than one. Stay away from my fucking wife, bitch! I ain't gonna warn you again.” The caller ended the call and the voice message came from an unknown number.
Text Message #2 2:39 AM from thegrip.com: “How would you like to pleasure the women in your life? Extend your length. Give the ladies something to really talk about! Text 32456 to find out how today!”
Voice Message #6 3:04 AM from Troy Lui: “We ain't heard from you so you must be incommunicado with Peggy, man. Be careful dude. Jealous spouses ain't no joke. You got both me and Helen concerned, though. Call somebody Bitch before we worry ourselves to death!”
Voice Message #7 5:08 AM from Richard Joffe code name Jackass: “Richard here. Sienna I don't appreciate being woken up at the crack of dawn by your homosexual degenerate loser friends. We all can't live in childish fantasies. Some of us have real life responsibilities. If you can pull yourself away from whatever indecent activity you are engaged in at 5 o'clock in the morning, please instruct your playmates not to call my home at ungodly hours in the morning in search of you. I'll only accept emergency calls on your behalf if you're dead or something.”
Text Message #3 5:43 PM from unlisted number: “Ask Ms. Jenkins the Japanese word for goodbye but be very careful when you do.” The caller ended the call and the voice message came from an unknown number.
The various messages provoked various emotions. Initially she cried, then she laughed then she got truly pissed off. She decided it was better to focus on responding to the messages then allowing her memories of what happened incapacitate her. Sienna dialed Troy first.
“Hey it's me. PAUSE. No listen. I was in the hospital and–”
LONG PAUSE
“No you don't have to come over. That's sweet and all. I just got into my apartment and I really, really need to be alone for a few hours. I haven't gotten any decent sleep in the last eighteen–”
LONG PAUSE
“Troy I appreciate all that but I really need to sleep. Just give me a few hours of rest then I'll tell you both everything that happened. I promise. I just need ‘me time' Okay?”
SHORT PAUSE
“Right back at you. Bye”
She called Lizz second getting her voice mail on the forth ring.
“Lizz stop drinking for goodness sake! Neither one of those bitches were good enough for you. I'll call you later.”
Finally she called her brother, Richard.
“Hi Suzanne is Richard home?
LONG PAUSE
I was supposed to meet up with them but my plans got abruptly changed,” Her words heavy with sarcasm.
LONG PAUSE
“Suzanne you're sweet and for the hundredth time I can't see how you ended up with my brother. I don't want to talk about all that right now I just want to speak to Richard, please. Thanks I'll try.”
After a long pause, Sienna yelled into the cell phone, “Richard? Bite me jackass!”
Shutting down her phone, Sienna was puzzled by that last text message. She wondered if Ms. Aguido sent it in reference to her noise complaint. Sienna sighed fighting the urge to cry again. All of that seemed so insignificant now. All she wanted to do was sleep for the next ten years as she climbed into her bed.
— — —
Sienna awoke with a persistent irritating itch on her right shoulder and down her right arm. She squinted at the windows taking note that the sun hadn't risen yet. She glanced at the LCD display on her clock radio. The time read 5:30 AM. She flopped back into her pillows content to fall back to sleep until the itching started again. Annoyed Sienna turned on her bedroom light and jumped out of bed to put a soothing slave on the row of itchy bumps she felt on her shoulder blade.
She padded into her bathroom and got the ointment from her medicine vanity cabinet. She rubbed a great deal of it her right shoulder blade. She took note of her various bruises in the mirror. She refused to tear up again as she washed her face and brushed her teeth. After she rinsed her mouth she turned off the light in the bathroom to go back into her bedroom.
As she approached her bed, she noticed three small red brown insects on her pillowcase. She groaned with annoyance. Time to do the laundry, she concluded. It was when she brushed the insects off her fluffy pillows and removed the pillowcases that she saw something horrible that made her scream in terror.
— — —
Karima was about to get ready to work on the same unit she had been laying bamboo flooring two days before her work schedule was upended by the trials and tribulations of her annoying tenant when she her a bloodcurdling scream coming from that tenant's apartment.
What the hell happened now? Was Karima's first and only thought when she ran out of her apartment with her trusty Glock and sprinted down the hall to her tenant's apartment. All she heard was hysterical screaming behind the closed locked door of the apartment. Without hesitation Karima kicked the door in at the weakest points along the hinges with five mighty powerful kicks. She slipped into the apartment gun first through the narrow opening she created.
She carefully searched the apartment noting that no other forced entry had occurred other than her own and no one else was in the apartment but her and the screaming woman. Karima spied her tenant standing on top of her marble inlay kitchen island screaming her head off. When Sienna saw Karima with her gun ready she screamed louder, thinking, Oh god she is going to kill me! I was a witness to her killing Kalid and now she's coming for me! What the hell did she do to my front door??? God why me? Why me? What the fuck do you want from me? It's just one fucking disaster after another.
Sienna screamed and kicked as Karima lifted her off the top of the island. She punched for all she was worth earning her a hot slap across her left check that shocked her. So she did what any self-respecting woman would do when slapped–she slapped Karima back, really hard.
Karima was a hair trigger from popping a cap in the woman's ass. Nobody slaps me! I didn't take that shit from Moms. I certainly ain't taking it from this chick , Karima thought as she slapped Sienna again–only to be slapped back harder once more.
Karima held her hot cheek with her gun free hand and stared hard at Sienna who was a mélange of fear, anger and hysteria–but matching her hard stare. Karima steeled her resolve then asked in a calm, soothing voice, “What the fuck is your problem?”
“I can't stop you from killing me, but I'm tired of people thinking they can just treat me like a punching bag! I'm tired of it!” Sienna cried.
“Kill you? With all that yelling, I thought someone was killing you! Which is a task I can completely understand someone wanting to undertake,” Karima threatened.
“Why did you break into my apartment if you aren't trying to kill me?” Sienna asked not trusting this dangerous woman for one moment. It seemed surreal to her to be talking calmly with her future murderer.
“You were screaming. I came to see what you were screaming about.” Karima explained to Sienna patronizingly through clenched teeth. I should have just minded my business . Karima thought.
“I saw you kill Kalid now you want to silence your only witness. Me. I know how you serial killers operate. I've seen Dexter you know.” Sienna spoke as a popular culture expert.
Karima rolled her eyes. This chick is crazier than I though t, she mused inwardly. “Do I look like a psychopathic white male aged 25 to 50 to you? I ain't a serial killer.” Karima sighed exasperated. She put her Glock away ready to exit the ‘Twilight Zone' situation with Senorita Looney Tunes and get back to her work.
“Then why do you have a gun like that? That's not a run of the mill protection gun. That thing is the serious deal. I've seen all the James Bond movies so I know what I'm talking about, and how did you kill Kalid without making any noise with your gun? Please don't kill me!” Sienna added meekly after a rapid-fire of probing questions.
“You need to stop watching violent films and TV shows. For the last fucking time I ain't killing you and I didn't kill that kid,” Karima exclaimed. She was at her wits end. This ungrateful–Nevermind, maybe I should kill her after all. At least I'll regain my piece of mind , she briefly pondered.
“I don't have time for this. I have work to do.” Karima spoke offhandedly as she turned to leave.
“What about my door? You can't leave it like that!” Sienna exclaimed.
“Karima looked at the damage to the door and offered, “It's on my ‘to do' list.”
“Wait a minute! You have to fix my bedroom first then my front door,” Sienna demanded. If the woman wasn't going to kill her at least she could deal with the horrors in her bedroom.
“What?” Karima asked as she reluctantly turned to face Sienna.
Sienna grabbed Karima by the arm but she was immovable. She tried to push her in the direction of her bedroom but Karima refused to budge folding her arms across her chest.
“You have to get rid of them! I can't sleep in there with them in there!” Sienna exclaimed.
Karima mental kicked herself in the ass as she withdrew her gun again. The bedroom was the only place in the apartment she didn't check for intruders. Shit! She thought. The element of surprise is totally blown!
Sienna jumped slightly when she saw the slick black gun re-emerge. Then she chuckled to herself when she realized why her building manager took it out again. She quipped, “You might be a good shot but don't you think that is a bit of overkill?”
“You said someone was in your bedroom.” Karima spoke very annoyed.
“I didn't say someone. Some things are in my bedroom and they have to go!” Sienna clarified.
“You mean you have pests in your bedroom?” Karima asked as it finally dawned on her what was going on. She put her gun away very annoyed–mostly at herself.
“Yes! Make them all go away! I think they've been biting me. God that's so disgusting!” Sienna screamed on the verge of yelling again.
“You scream again and I'll knock you out cold. You got me?” Karima threatened.
“Oh am I being too noisy? Am I disturbing your sense of quiet and peace? I can't imagine how disturbing that can be!” Sienna exclaimed heavy with sarcasm.
Karima rolled her eyes and walked into Sienna's bedroom. Everything seemed in order to her. A decent unmade queen sized bed. Check. End tables on either side. Check. A chest of drawers. Check.
“Look around my bed! They were under my pillows.” Sienna directs.
Karima looked at the discarded pillowcases on the floor beside the bed that Sienna dropped when she ran out of her bedroom screaming like a banshee. She examined the uncovered pillows. Nothing she looked under the comforter. A big zero.
Whatever she saw they were long gone by now. Probably ran in terror after all that screaming , Karima smirked to herself.
“What did they look like?” Karima inquired.
“Small round brownish red disgusting things.” Sienna offered from the doorway she refused to reenter her violated ‘sanctuary of rest' until the vile things were wiped off the face of the earth.
Karima immediately removed all the bed covering stuffing them into the empty pillowcases. She impressed Sienna with her brute strength as she lifted the mattress off the box spring. Karima removed the dust ruffle stuffing that too into the packed pillowcase. She took out a flashlight on her utility key ring and examined the box spring. She lifted it up off the frame and studied its underside. Her suspicions confirmed she donned a pair of work gloves stuffed in her back jean pocket and began carrying the box spring out of the bedroom area.
“Where are you going with my bed?” Sienna asked as she backs away.
“Gotta wrap this and discard it. I'll come back for the mattress. You gonna need a whole new bed. You got bedbugs.”
“Bedbugs??? I don't have bedbugs!!! I keep a clean, tidy home!” Sienna exclaimed as she unlocked her broken front door. The metal slab that used to provide protection fell down in a loud crash into the hallway.
“Don't have nothing to do with how clean you are. You get em you got to get rid of them. The cleaner you are the easier it is to get rid of them.” Karima explained under the weight of her burden. “Like I said I'll be back for the mattress. I noticed some holes underneath it when I leaned it against the wall.” She reminded Sienna as she stepped over the fallen door and disappeared into the hallway.
Sienna was a ball of nervous energy until Karima returned for the mattress. She watched through hooded eyes as Karima returned to her apartment with a large roll of clear plastic. She was briefly concerned that the enigmatic woman was going to use it to catch any tell tale blood splatter, then she disregarded that thought thinking perhaps her building manager was right. Maybe I should stop watching violent movies .
She watched as Karima tightly wrapped the mattress in the plastic sealing it tight with duck tape. As she leaned the wrapped mattress against the wall, Sienna's fear lost the fight with her anger as she accused her, “I should sue you for misrepresentation! This place must have been a bug infested crack house!”
Karima laughed, “How'd you think you got such a good price for this place? Besides it could have been worst.”
“What the hell is worst than living in a renovated crack house?” Sienna asked.
“Owning property that was used to dispose of dead bodies. The phrenic energy of such a place can give you nightmares for days. Or owning a place used for toxic dumping. No manner of renovation can get that sort of place up to code. But it don't stop folks from selling that garbage to gullible suburbanites eager for city life,” Karima revealed.
Sienna stared hard at Karima trying to discern if the woman was telling the truth or pulling her leg. You can't be certain with these gun toting types , Sienna mused.
“All right when I drop this down stairs for disposal pick up you're gonna have to get this unit ready for the exterminators,” Karima explained as she lifted the mattress in her arms.
“How am I supposed to do that?” Sienna asked
“Clean and bag everything. Dry cleaning, everything in your closets, your drawers, curtains, pillows and anything fabric in storage. These buggers have microscopic eggs that float. Clean it, dry all fabric at high heat then bag it and seal it tight. That shit has to stay isolated for weeks until all the extermination cycles are completed. So have a few clothes out you can rotate. You'll probably want to stay someplace else until it is over with.” Karima instructed hopeful that the woman would stay elsewhere for the time being.
“That's going to cost a fortune! Wait how long is this going to take?” Sienna groaned.
“Two weeks until the first extermination visit. They'll pump some of the good poison in the walls and the spray down everything wooden inside the drawers and closets. You know the drill. Then you gotta wait another two weeks to see anything before they come back again for another treatment. Sometimes they gotta come back a third time. It depends you know? All in all it takes anywhere from four to six weeks to make sure you got rid of them.” Karima instructed.
Then her suspicious, imaginative mind took over as she asked, “ How do you know so much about it? She could have put those vile things in my loft to get rid of me , she thought.
Karima laughed, “Like I said it ain't about being dirty. More like traveling a lot. See you pick them up when you travel out of the country and then you bring them back. From the state of your box spring, you had them for a while but it wasn't a bad infestation. So think back to the last time you traveled out of the country. Hotels are the best places to pick these buggers up. You can also pick ‘em up traveling in the city subways and buses if someone sitting next to you has them.”
Karima left Sienna alone with her many questions to place the wrapped mattress downstairs. She had already called the exterminators for the entire building after she wrapped the box spring. She was content that the unexpected pests would forestall the little woman's inquires about her role in the events over the last two days.
Sienna processed what her building manager said then she started working on washing the bed linen and her pillows then drying them in the dryer in her pantry. She found a box of unopened and unused black hefty bags so she began filling them with clean dried clothes and sealing them tightly. She heard the loud music which signaled that her building manager had resumed working on the building. So Sienna used the time to begin sorting out clothes she could wash and clothes that had to go to the cleaners. When she saw the expensive pile of dry cleaning she had to have done Sienna was resolved to only buy clothes that she could throw into the washing machine in the future.
It was six o'clock in the evening when the loud music stopped and Sienna sat in her living room in a sea of over eighty filled and sealed black hefty bags. She looked over to her front door and she saw the building manager removing the damaged hinges from the doorframe.
Sienna got up from the floor and walked to her kitchen to grab a glass of ice-cold water to drink. She silently offered a glass to Karima who declined. Sienna watched the tall woman as she worked to repair her doorway. Many questions formed in her head, but she didn't want to antagonize the woman when she was keeping her word at fixing the damage she had done. Then Sienna began to recall all that she knew about the woman from her observations. It was when she remembered what happened to her in the subway, Sienna grimaced in guilt.
My god this woman saves my life and I accuse her of being a serial killer! She didn't shoot to kill Kalid he fell to his death. Great job being a decent human being Sienna! Sienna mentally berated herself.
She had so many things she wanted to say, but she decided to speak what was most appropriate, “Thank you.”
“I broke it so I fit it.” Karima offered dismissively.
Sienna walked over to Karima and stilled her hand screwing in a new upper hinge bracket. Puzzled Karima looked at Sienna who stared openly into her wide-open eyes. For the first time she saw more in those brown eyes than anyone ever had. She saw things that Karima didn't know she possessed: compassion, hidden innocence an ancient wisdom and her soul.
“Thank you for saving my life,” Sienna smiled genuinely appreciative. She hugged the taller woman, closing her eyes over grateful tears. With a screwdriver in hand Karima reluctantly hugged the smaller woman back, catching a strong scent of the lavender shampoo she used.
This one is a hugger , Karima sighed.
Sienna released the hug first sensing her savior's discomfort and smiled up at her. Okay this was the second time this month that Karima was caught flatfooted and she grimaced not liking it one bit. Sienna saw the grimace, which looked more like a pout.
A rather cute pout.
Karima couldn't understand why the penetrating stare from the little woman was so unnerving. She grunted and quickly returned her attention to the task at hand. The quicker I get this done the faster I can leave , she told herself.
Sienna smiled seeing the real woman she saw in the drug store, a woman willing to sacrifice for injustice. Gosh that seemed like a lifetime ago , she thought. She looked around her beloved loft now a warehouse for fat black hefty bags with a sigh. She looked again at Karima and smiled wanting to know everything about the woman. Then she remembered that she was a bit annoyed with her reluctant, shy heroine for leaving her all alone in the subway.
“So you've traveled a lot?” Sienna probed.
“What?” Karima asked half listening, half ignoring her tenant.
“You know so much about the bug thing I guessed you traveled a lot. So you've traveled a lot?” Sienna probed again. She had a determined curiosity that demanded satisfaction.
“Yeah… I traveled a bit.” Karima offered while she fought with the alignment of the door jam. She grimaced recognizing that she kicked it out of whack. That would have to be fixed first before she could continue , she decided.
“So where'd did you go? What countries did you visit?” Sienna asked as she pulled up one of her breakfast nook stools and sat on it facing the busy Karima.
“You ask a lot of questions,” Karima observed.
“Just passing time. You're back in This Old House mode; you might be tempted to turn on your music again so I figured conversation would be better, for both of us. I'd like to get to know the woman who helped me out of an awful situation. Let's see… I've been to Europe, Japan , Singapore and Canada . What parts of the world have you seen?” Sienna spoke out in a rapid fire, stream of consciousness sort of way,
Karima stopped working and raised a single eyebrow. She didn't stop to take a breath , she marveled. She smiled mischievously knowing how truth can be used to advantage. “I've seen and been in places you wouldn't be comfortable visiting.”
“Why?” Sienna asked innocently.
“Those places were horror stories for women. Let's see South America, Eastern Africa, a remote village in India , Afghanistan pre-Taliban. Any place where women disappeared regularly and no one bats an eye or inquires why. The kinda places where those serial killers you like to watch on TV can practice their hobbies without interruptions. Those kinda places.” Karima revealed laying it on thick with ominous mystery.
Sienna digested that until her next question poked out to be spoken, “But you're a woman! Why weren't those places horrible for you too?”
“I am a woman with a gun who knows how to use it.” Karima winked.
Insightfully, Sienna asked, “Did you go to those kinds of places to learn how to–”
Sienna stopped her question in mid-sentence realizing that she didn't want to know THAT about her savior, at least not yet. The heavy silence between them was as disturbing to Sienna as those loud booming bass beats.
Then she remembered, continuing her probing, “You said that Kalid didn't die. How do you know that he didn't?” Sienna asked.
Karima abruptly stopped working. She had what Sienna could best describe as a deer caught in headlights look. She smiled at how easy it was to catch the mysterious, potentially dangerous woman off guard.
“He was taken to the same hospital you were taken to. They couldn't tell me anything except that he was stable,” Karima revealing a half-truth, hoping the matter was finally laid to rest.
“How did you know WHICH hospital I was taken to?” Sienna asked.
Karima exhaled exasperated. “You ask too many questions! You ever consider that some things just ain't your business?” Karima cried out.
“When it pertains to yours truly , I have the right to know everything. Besides you abandoned me to wait by myself so I'm curious how you would know to which hospital the ambulance took me,” Sienna offered smugly.
“I didn't abandon you.” Karima spoke quietly. Why the hell did I just say that? She wondered.
“I watched you walk away!” Sienna accused as she pointed to Karima.
“I didn't abandon you.” Karima repeated quietly.
“Of course you didn't.” Sienna offered insincerely.
“Remember that old woman they wheeled into your room? The one that chased the orderlies and escaped into the night–that was me. I checked up on the boy before I left the hospital.” Karima revealed.
This time Sienna was caught flatfooted with her mouth wide open in shock.
“You'll catch flying bugs if you stay like that,” cautioned Karima with a smirk.
“Why did you– Why didn't you speak to me?” Sienna asked when her voice found her mouth.
Karima thought deeply before answering.
“Rape is a funny thing. It can make you think you're all alone. That no one could possibly know what you're going through. Their sympathy just pisses you off. Mostly you think that it was all your fault. You run scenarios in your head how you could have done it differently. None of that shit helps. Forgetting helps best but the mind is a curious thing. Intermediate algebra you'll forget that shit like a second after the test even after you done studied over three weeks for it. The first dude or chick to take your virginity? You know you're getting old when you can remember everything about the event but said dude or chick's name. Now rape, that bullshit stays and stays. Can't seem to shake it. Mostly you don't want to talk to nobody and you don't want to be seen by nobody. Most folks can do for you is just be there even when you don't know they're there.” Karima explained cryptically.
Tears welled in Sienna's eyes when she realized, “Someone raped you.”
Karima acknowledged this with a head nod ever so slightly, indifferent to what anyone thought of her.
“What happened?” Sienna asked as she wiped her hot tears away. She marveled at how stoically Karima recalled everything, realizing that it must have happened a long time ago, when she was just a kid.
“That shit was mostly my fault ‘cause we was, you know, sexing it up at the time but it turned from that to something else. I guess that's why I stopped him from trying to do what he was going to do you. The boy I mean.” Karima revealed.
“Never think THAT was your fault! The moment you didn't want him anymore he was supposed to stop. Period! What happened to Kalid?” Sienna asked after she tried to stress how faultless Karima was in what had happened to her.
“He'll live. And he'll remember. It's better that he remembers the right way. He'll look down at what's left of his body and never forget. Cause that's what rapists do, make you uncomfortable in your body, uncomfortable in your skin. So they should feel trapped and betrayed by their bodies. They should feel cursed in their skin,” Karima concluded darkly.
“What happened to the one who hurt you?” Sienna asked, She wanted to hurt him herself for causing Karima such soul numbing pain; she got a faint glimpse of in her eyes.
“If I told you, I'd have to kill you,” Karima smirked in a way Sienna found enticingly sexy.
— — —
After a long afternoon of questioning the coworkers of the victim Sienna Joffe at the Concourse Preparatory School, Detective Harper and Detective Richardson once again pulled up to the curb along side the Happy Land restaurant equipment warehouse in West Flushing where they had gone earlier. It used to be managed by Victor Lui the patriarch of the Lui family. He sold equipment for pizzerias, diners, and Chinese restaurants all over the city. But he was retired and other family members managed the business.
Mostly the Lui family business inventory consisted of refurbished ovens, Chinese stoves, heat ventilators, countertops, char-boilers, ice cream freezers, Deli grade meat and cheese slicers, and restaurant grade refrigerators confiscated from foreclosed restaurants and auctioned off by the city.
Detective Richardson took note of the Asian men is suits that didn't seem to do anything but standing around watchful with characteristic gun bulges under their jackets. One young Asian man wearing a crisp white shirt with the sleeves rolled up, black slacks, and dark black sunglasses, brazenly wore his automatic weapon in a leather holster that matched his brown leather belt and shoes. He approached the two Detectives before they could enter the warehouse.
“I like a man who can accessorize his wardrobe with his gun.” Detective Harper flirted to dispel the young man's hostility.
“What the fuck you want? I ain't paying you shit! Them other pigs got their weekly taste so you can shove the fuck off!” The angry young man shouted.
“Are you implying that someone employed as an officer of the law by the metro police has been taking graft from you Son?” Detective Richardson inquired professionally. He knew the disgusting habit was part and parcel to policing certain areas of the city, but he didn't like it. Graft gave him a bad taste in his mouth. As Detective Richardson saw it he may very well be the violent, homophobic, misogynistic, racist cop in those numerous misconduct reports in his thick file at headquarters but he wasn't a dirty cop. Dirty cops sullied the profession and fouled the air. Detective Richardson spit out the bad taste building in his mouth.
Detective Harper didn't want to open up a can of worms she just wanted to get tracked on the current case of the shy assassin from the subway. She glanced at her annoying partner's mien knowing that if his buttons were pushed, another brutality complaint was soon to be filed against him. So she took matters into her own hands, “We're not here for that. We need to speak with Uncle Victor. Is he around?”
“What you need the old man for? He's retired. I run this shit now and I don't need to speak to you. So jump back in that piece of shit hoopty and be gone!” Victor Lui's grandnephew, Bing Ocasio-Lui commanded for everyone in earshot to hear. He wanted everyone to know he didn't fear cops and he didn't like having to work with them from time to time. He was very sensitive to the fact that he was half Chinese and half Dominican. Although he looked fully Asian, he knew many in the clan dismissed him because he was of mixed race. That pissed him off. But not as much as money flying our of his pocket. He was especially heated when the recent graft payment increased a whopping twenty percent. Fuck the recession! Bing thought hotly.
“The old man has information stored in the vast file cabinet called his brain that we need access to–our inquiry will not in anyway sully your business nor bring unwanted attention to him or you,” Detective Harper spoke trying to sooth Bing's irritated nature.
“We don't negotiate with punks! We should haul his ass downtown.” Detective Richardson suggested ominously.
“You sound like a fucking police cliché. Our precinct is uptown not downtown!” Detective Harper corrected. “Go wait by the car, I'll handle this. Go!” The senior detective commanded.
Detective Richardson hesitated moving until he recognized ‘the good cop bad cop' technique and backed off.
“Bing, I got three questions for the old man, just the three, and then I'm outta here. Now we could leave empty handed but then we'd have to come back, again and again and again. We might have to start hanging out here. Policing an entire city of over eight million different personalities is hard ass work! Cops are always looking for a place to chill out after working hours. This place looks decent enough. So Bing it's a choice between three questions then we go far, far away or we become the very best of friends. What's your pleasure Bing?” Detective Harper asked innocently.
Bing stared at the female detective with distain. He never liked her. Her cocky attitude reminder him of his twin sister, Troy . She was an annoying bitch too. As much as Troy 's life style plagued Bing's sense of honor, she was his baby sister and family watched each other's back no matter if they wanted to kill each other too. He spit on the ground a few times before he answered, “Uncle is across the street at the community center with the old timers. For future reference my name is Mr. Lui to you.”
Bing walked off giving orders to workers in both Cantonese and Spanish.
Detective Harper called her partner over. They crossed the street to enter the Flushing Community Center , which was filled with Chinese senior citizens talking, a group of women playing má jiàng and another large group of men surrounding a table where two men were playing a game of chess. Men who discretely were placing bets on their game surrounded the two chess players drinking small cups of tea.
Detective Harper recognized one of the players as Uncle Victor. She flashed her gold detective shield and the tight crowd around the men playing quickly dissipated. Victor Lui was a slight elder Chinese man with a full head of black hair. His temples naturally frosted white. He had an infectious smile as he looked up at the female officer who he remembered from her early days on the force as a patrolman.
“Detective Harper we haven't spoken in a long time. I miss our chess matches. You were a formidable opponent.”
Detective Richardson was surprised there was history between his partner and the ‘retired' crime boss. He briefly wondered what other secrets the cocky woman detective was keeping from him.
“You mean I was an easy mark,” Detective Harper laughed. Uncle Victor smiled too. Then she apologized for her lapse in good manners, “Uncle Victor I've been so busy with work and family that I've neglected visiting you and for that I truly apologize because I enjoyed our games as well.”
“Yes your beautiful daughters Bailey and Zoë. You must be proud of them. Enjoy this time because they grow up so quickly. They grow up to become the pains in the ass like my nephew Bing. Bing told you where I was, no?” Uncle Victor asked as he offered a seat and some tea to Detective Harper.
“He's still a hothead but the warehouse looks like it's in good hands.” Detective Harper stated as she sat down beside the old man who didn't stop playing the chess game as he moved his bishop into the attack. His opponent moaned slightly as he studied his next move.
Detective Richardson didn't realize how closely Detective Harper knew the Lui family until he watched shocked as Victor Lui, the notorious crime lord who never got caught from 1980 to 2003 personally serve tea to Detective Harper and she drank it without hesitation, nodding respectfully before she did.
“The boy has good business sense. He just carries grudges too long. He's too sensitive. Worries too much what others think. With that kind of thinking he can only go as far as the opinions of others and no farther. Now his sister Troy , she is the real deal but she wants to do it on her own. What can you do? You just sit back and watch them make their own way in the world.” Uncle Victor added as he took his opponents rook.
“So how is Troy doing?” Detective Harper asked mildly interested in the outcome of the game. She could see Uncle Victor was just toying with his opponent. Uncle Victor had checkmate in three moves.
“I wondered when you'd ask about her. It really surprised me when you married but I understand your need to create a family. It's too strong an urge to deny.” Uncle Victor lectured knowingly.
Detective Harper then remembered why she stayed away from the Lui family all those years, to distance herself from the emotionally dangerous Troy Lui. She needed to get the questioning back on track with the case and stop the curiosity growing in Detective Richardson's small mind. It was hard to get things that don't concern him out of that pea sized brain of his , Detective Harper smirked to herself.
She inquired further, “Uncle Victor the real reason we're here is I'm interested in finding someone you may have heard about in the past. A black male hit-man? He may have worked for the Espinosas back in the day.”
“The Espinosa family? Yes I remember them. They wiped each other out in a blood feud. Foolish people. There were rumors but they disappeared like smoke after the bloodshed. I know of no hitters of that description working presently.” Uncle Victor volunteered.
“So there are hitters working NOW in the city?” Detective Richardson jumped in with his ill-timed question.
“Please forgive my partner. He is quick of fist but short of brain.” Detective Harper apologized.
“I see why Troy liked you. As for the Espinosa's, those hitters they didn't work under the Espinosas. I heard the Pabons ran that operation and as I remember it had only one guy. A tall black guy. He must have been very busy. He would be almost as old as me by now! He's probably dead. Is that who you are looking for?” Uncle Victor asked as he moved to trap his opponents' knight with his rook.
“You recall this hitter's name Uncle Victor?” Detective Harper asked.
Uncle Victor was deciding whether to end the game in one move or three. He could drag it along but he was getting tired and wanted to take a nap so he checkmated his opponent with his remaining bishop. His disappointed opponent took up all the empty teacups from the table to be washed. He thought he had his older friend on the run there. He vowed one day to beat him at chess as he walked away.
“Didn't know his real name but I think they called him Truth or Sincere.” Uncle Victor revealed with a smile. Detective Harper wrote that down in her notebook.
— — —
Sienna examined her completely fixed, new door. She marveled at how Karima was able to fix it so that the previous damage wasn't noticeable at all. The door jam needed a new paint job but she forbade the industrious woman from working until the late hours on something that could be fixed in the morning. Besides Sienna wasn't incapable. I could handle a minor paint job myself , she thought. She was about to lock her apartment door when she felt rather than heard frantic knocking on it.
She opened the door and Troy , Helen and Lizz all spilled into her apartment. Helen was aghast when she saw the bruises on Sienna's face and neck. Lizz wondered if Sienna was moving with all the black hefty bags all over the vast space, or if she was so caught up in her lust with Peggy that the laundry had gotten out of hand.
“What are you guys doing here?” Sienna asked bewildered.
“Did Peggy's husband do this to you?” Troy asked as she examined Sienna's face closely. Cop or no cop, folks don't mess with my friends like that , Troy mused.
“No.” Sienna responded noncommittally as she moved away from Troy 's intense scrutiny.
“Damn girl what happened in here? You certainly got a lot of laundry,” Lizz observed while examining the contents of one particular bag.
“Give me that! They have to stay sealed up!” Sienna exclaimed as she snatched black hefty bag away from Lizz and resealed it.
“Excuse us for caring! You been threatened by a lover's husband. We don't hear from you for 24 hours. Then when you finally turn up you've been in the hospital, but you won't say how you got there. When we heard a student at your school died we thought you were in a deep depression over it.” Lizz rambled on.
“Trust me I'd never get depressed over that!” Sienna responded hotly.
“Honey I thought you loved your students. Well most of them.” Helen offered.
“I already know he didn't die but if he did trust me I wouldn't lose any sleep over it!” Sienna responded.
“Who didn't die?” Troy asked.
“The kid who tried to rape me.”
Upon hear that news, Troy 's anger spread red across her face and pooled into her tightly clenched fists.
“Oh my God!” Helen cried. “Is that why you were in the hospital?” She asked.
Sienna nodded shamefully. If she only knew how to defend herself– she stopped berating herself once she remembered that Karima knew exactly what she was going through. She planned to ask the enigmatic woman to teach her how to defend herself in the future. Considering how she handles herself there could be no better teacher , Sienna decides.
“ Troy please don't be upset. He didn't get a chance to do it. He was stopped.” Sienna revealed as she saw her friend about to explode.
“Who stopped him?” Troy asked. She planned to give the person a medal, even if it was a cop.
“My building manager, Karima stopped him but don't make a fuss about it and don't talk about it to anyone. She's a very private person. The police think a man helped me and I'd rather leave it like that.” Sienna said.
“I thought you were contemplating having her bumped off because of all the noise she makes?” Troy asked with a smirk.
Sienna rolled her eyes. “Well I've learned a lot in the past twenty-four hours that I didn't know before. I still wish she would tune the music down but I am lucky I'm still alive and well to be pissed off about it thanks to her. Wait what student died?”
“Honey, a student at your school committed suicide yesterday. It's in the news. She was the victim of “sexting”. Some boy videotaped her in a compromising situation and blasted it all over your school. The poor girl jumped to her death. Her name was Sherraine,” Helen tried to sooth the blow of really bad news.
“God! That's horrible! I knew her! I never taught her, but I knew of her,” Sienna exclaimed as tears formed in her eyes.
Lizz decided, “I think you should stay with me Sienna, for a few days. Pack your shit and let's go, chica!”
“No I need to stay.” Sienna refused.
“You can't stay here with all these bags all over the place. You need to rest and heal. You can't do that here!” Helen argued trying to reason with stubborn Sienna.
Troy kept out of it knowing the worst place to be was in between two stubborn women on opposite sides of a disagreement.
Sienna looked around her loft. With no bed and her place is an ordered state of chaos, Helen was right that she wouldn't heal properly here but she didn't want to stay with Lizz nor with Troy and Helen. Peggy was totally out of the question. Then she smiled as she decided where she would stay. It really was a no-brainer , Sienna decided.
— — —
Karima changed into sweat pants and a tee shirt after a nice long soak in her peach scented bubble bath to soothe her aching muscles. She worked hard today and she knew she would be fatigued enough to sleep through the night.
There was a slight knock on her door, which surprised her since it was well after 10 PM as she glanced at her wall clock. She was about to ignore the knocking when the pattern repeated only louder. She walked over to her door and looked through the peephole. It was her tenant distorted by the fish eyeglass.
What does she want now? Karima wondered. She thought that when she let the woman's friends in the building earlier in the evening they would scoop her up and away so Karima could focus of flushing out Sincere from whatever rock he was hiding under.
Karima reluctantly unlocked her apartment door's five locks. She opened the door a crack and asked, "What can I do for you now?”
“Do you have those disgusting bedbugs in your apartment too?” Sienna asked.
“No but I planned to have my spot fumigated. Is that all you wanted to know?” Karima asked.
“Good.” Sienna responded as she slipped past Karima into her inner ‘sanctum sanctorum'. Sienna looked around taking note of the Spartan but neat setting of Karima's apartment.
“Excuse you! Don't you have an apartment just down the hall?” Karima asked the exasperating little woman.
“Apartment yes. Bed, no. I thought it best to buy a new one after all the debugging treatments were over. Don't you? Since you're having them spray your apartment too I decided I should stay here–with you. I don't want to infect my friends' homes with those disgusting things. Besides I need to hire protection. So far your resume is on the top of the pile,” Sienna explained in her stream of consciousness way.
“I don't offer my services out for protection.” Karima quietly said.
“You should. You are a natural. I wanted to ask you to teach me how to defend myself, but hiring you is the best option. Think of how easy it will be to keep watch over your client when I'll be right here with you! I don't take up much space. I'm relatively neat. And best of all I'm not noisy at all!” Sienna cooed.
“What do you need protection for?” Karima asked.
“My lover's husband. If an ex-student of mine will get bent out of shape enough to try to harm me because I supposedly disrespected him. Dealing with Peggy's husband isn't going to be a piece of cake. Henceforth, you're hired. Where do I sleep?” Sienna asked nonchalantly.
Karima rolled her eyes shutting the door behind her and turned to face the natural girlish exuberance that is Sienna. Now she had two new things on her ‘to do' list. Continue keeping her tenant relatively free of harm and find Sincere. Great just great! Karima mused.