Each time Damita took a breath or stopped talking, Lester gave her another spoonful of the sundae he had made. His action achieved the desired outcome. Although she was discussing something very painful, the introduction of the ice cream made her smile each time she took another spoonful.
“There are ways to figure certain things out without leaving you vulnerable.”
“What kind of ways?”
“There are a few. First, we could hire a private detective. You could call your mother or Carmella from a phone that could never be traced back to you or your location. Or, you could simply pick up the phone and tell them where you are and why you did what you did.”
“I couldn’t do that. Then everyone would know it was me that killed Neal; they would at least suspect it.”
“You’re probably right about that, so you have to be smart about all this. I know you’re sick of cowering in the shadows, but think about Constance. She’s done it for years and she managed to find her happiness by making a few sacrifices.”
“The difference, though, Lester, is she was able to make those sacrifices without having to sacrifice the closest person to her; you. I miss my mother so much sometimes, it hurts.”
“Then you should find some sort of a way to get in contact with her. From all the stories you told me about your mother, she sounds like a smart woman. Something tells me if you did call her, she’d know how to handle it.”
Damita smiled. “Yeah, my mother is a smart cookie. I should’ve taken her advice when she told me she didn’t think Neal was right for me. She knew right away. I don’t know why it took me so long to figure it out.”
“Do you think your mother would like me?”
“I know she would like you.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“My mother always talked about people being real. Sincerity was important to her. That was the one thing Neal didn’t have. But, you my dear, are a different story altogether. You are loaded with all sorts of sincerity, honesty and integrity.”
“See, you almost had me there for a minute, until you mentioned integrity.”
“You do have integrity.”
“Do you know what I was thinking that night when we got off the bus in Seattle and you were walking toward the hotel? I told you I could help you, but what I was really thinking was if I played my cards right, I would get a chance to spend the night under those nice crisp hotel room sheets with you.”
“I already knew that. That’s what any man would have been thinking under those circumstances.”
Lester faked a pout. “I’m hurt. You’ve reduced me to being no better than any other horny toad in the street.”
“You’re not, baby; you’re my horny toad,” Damita said, kissing him on the forehead.
“Don’t try to soften me up. Now I know what you really think of me.”
“Poor baby. What can I do to make you feel better?”
Lester moved the bowl of ice cream and moved Damita’s head to face his staff, which was once again hard.
“You want to know what you can do to make me feel better? You can kiss it and make it all better.”
Damita didn’t think she had ever met a man that was ready to go as quickly and as frequently as Lester. No sooner than they were lying in bed, enjoying the afterglow, he would rise to attention, again, and again, and again. She wasn’t complaining, but she hoped she would continue to be able to keep up with him. In the meantime, she was enjoying the ride.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Over time, Damita fell into some pretty commonplace routines. She was surprised to find that she liked it. Her relationship with Constance had evolved into a great friendship and it didn’t hurt that Constance’s brother was completely in love with Damita. The job was going well and even though she had declined any and all promotions offered, she still received a raise after having worked there for a year.
She enjoyed her Friday nights with Constance and Lester. Sometimes her and Constance stayed at home and watched movies together or went to a movie or dinner. Other times Lester would tag along and they would go bowling or dancing. Saturday night was all Lester’s. He often told her it was his favorite day of the week. No matter what was going on she made sure that Saturday was reserved for him. For the first time, she was able to learn about compromise in a relationship. It felt really good.
“What’s cracking for tonight?” Lester asked one Friday night.
“Isn’t tonight our bowling night?”
“That it is. I look forward to kicking some butt tonight. I hope you bring your A-game.”
“Consider it brought,” Damita said.
“Oh yeah, I love a challenge. It’s on tonight!”
“Are you sure we’re still talking about bowling?” Damita asked.
“Hell yeah. Oh. . .and that other stuff, too,” he said, laughing.
“I should have known.”
“I’m going to go hang out at Constance’s house for a while. She called me today and I was busy at work and couldn’t talk. She sounded like she was having a bad day. You can pick us up over there when you’re ready.”
“No problem!”
When Damita arrived, Constance seemed out of sorts. She kept checking and rechecking the locks and the face Damita usually associated with being consistently pleasant and smiling, now had a pained expression.
“Constance, please come and sit down.”
Even after she sat down she continued to shift uncomfortably in her seat and glanced frequently toward the window.
“Lester should be here soon. He’s coming to pick us up so we can go bowling,” Damita reminded Constance.
Constance looked fearful. “I don’t think we should go tonight,” Constance said.
“Okay, Constance, tell me right now what’s going on. I’m worried about you.”
“Damita, I think he’s back.”
“What makes you think that? Why would he come back after all these years?”
“He’s back to destroy my happiness.”
Damita tried her best to reassure her. “No, Constance. You’re fine. He’s not back. You’re experiencing some anxiety, that’s all. You’ve been working so hard lately at work. All you need is a vacation.”
“Wouldn’t that be nice? I don’t remember the last time I’ve been on a real vacation,” Constance said.
“Then, maybe we should plan one. I could use a vacation myself.”
“I’ve always been resentful that because of Neal I missed my trip to Jamaica. Why don’t we go there? We could get some sun, do a little swimming, go to the spa. What do you think?”
“It sounds glorious.”
“Then, that’s what we’ll do.”
“Damita, you know the reason I never go on vacation?”
“No. Why?”
“I’m afraid of running into him or anyone that might know him. I feel protected here. I feel like the risk of running into him or someone who knows him is greatly reduced in Seattle. Now, a place like Jamaica, you never can tell.”
“I never thought about it that way. I can’t imagine being in Jamaica having fun and running into my mother or Carmella, or even one of my former coworkers from Underhill. I would hate it if they found out I was alive that way.”
“I’m worried for different reasons. I’m afraid that if Jack finds me he will kill me. He vowed he would never give me up. Once he told me he would rather see me dead than to allow someone else to have me. The moment I heard those words, I knew life would never be normal for me ever again.”
“Open up, it’s the police,” Lester said, joking around and knocking on the door.
“Stay there, Constance. I’ll get it.” She opened the door and let him in. “Chill out tonight. Your sister thinks Jack may be back and she’s freaking out.”
“She goes through this every couple of years. It lasts for a few days, then eventually, she comes down and everything goes back to normal.”
“I hope you’re right.”
“
You’ll see. She’ll be fine in a few days.”
• • •
Constance wasn’t fine in a few days. With each passing day she became more and more fearful, until she refused to even go outside. Damita would call in for her but that would only last but so long. Eventually the job was going to get fed up and fire Constance. She knew how much Constance liked her job and she didn’t want her to get fired. Damita decided to take another approach and at the very least consider the possibility that Constance was right and Jack had in fact returned. She decided she would talk to Constance in an effort to understand what she was seeing that no one else seemed to see.
Damita looked at Constance with concern. “Constance, why do you think he’s back?”
“I come in and things have been changed and moved around. I went to work one day and there was a note on my computer that read what do you think you’re doing? I asked everyone in the office and no one had left the note.”
“Constance, you know how catty those girls in the office are. They probably did it as sport. You got that promotion they all wanted. They want to unnerve you. Don’t let them do it.”
“Why now? It’s been almost a year since I got that promotion. Why would they be doing this now? That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Do jealous, twisted people ever really make sense?”
“Thanks, Damita. I feel better already.”
“While we try to solve this mystery, what do you say if we leave this apartment? It’s not healthy for you to be cooped up in here all alone.”
“I’m fine, Damita. Don’t worry about me.”
“I have to worry. You’re my best friend. Not only that, you’re the sister of my boyfriend. I kind of like the sound of that.”
“You’re probably sick of bowling, but Lester really wanted to take the two of us out dancing. He’ll be so disappointed if you don’t go.”
“He’ll get over it,” Constance said.
“Yeah, I’m sure he will, but then I’ll have to listen to him whine about it all night. Come on, Constance. Please?”
“Okay, okay, I’ll go. But, please tell your boyfriend to dress less like a bullfighter and more like a regular person.”
“Was that hilarious or what? People were looking at him like he was the entertainment.”
“Not him, they were looking at us; him with those twirls and the dipping. I swear sometimes I think my brother was dropped on his head when he was little.”
Damita smiled in recognition of what she had. “There’s nothing wrong with Lester. He thinks outside the box; that’s all. He’s teaching me how to do that. I like the idea of expanding my horizons and seeing things another way. I was locked inside of a box for so long it’s good to finally feel like I have the opportunity to be free.”
“I remember what that felt like. That was the way I felt when I first came here. It was so nice not to have someone call me a bitch every five minutes or check my underwear to make sure I hadn’t been having sex with someone. When you live a life like that long enough you forget what it’s like to be normal.”
“So true,” Damita agreed.
“I’ll go get dressed,” Constance said.
“Yeah, let’s go out and be normal.”
“That’s going to be kind of difficult with my brother along.”
“I’ve figured your brother out. He’s not as crazy or different as he makes himself out to be. He’s a loving man. Both my life and yours have been so crazy, Lester just wants to maintain a little levity. You can’t fault him for that. To reveal this would mean he has a soft side and he wouldn’t be able to maintain his image as a sexist pig, so don’t tell him I know his secret. It would devastate him.”
“I’ll be sure to keep it to myself.”
Damita and Constance got dressed and put on makeup and waited for Lester to arrive. He was on time and very tastefully dressed.
“Wow,” he said when he arrived.
“You don’t look too shabby yourself, there,” Damita said.
“I am going to have the two most gorgeous women in the place on my arm. I dare any of those losers to come near my girls.”
“Listen to you. Behave yourself, brother dear. Besides, it takes a special kind of man to come and ask me to dance.”
“What does that mean?” Damita asked.
“I’m pretty tall for a woman and a lot of men are intimated by my height.”
Once in the club, Lester took turns dancing with both Constance and Damita and a few times danced with both of them at the same time. At one point there was a very romantic, slow song playing and Constance encouraged Damita and Lester to go dance.
“You don’t need to babysit me,” she said.
They were dancing close together, enjoying keeping time with the music, when suddenly the spell was broken by a scream.
Lester suddenly looked worried. “I think that was Constance,” Lester said.
They ran from the dance floor and found Constance sitting with her back up against a wall. She was drenched in a drink from her face to the middle of her dress.
“Constance, what happened?” Lester asked.
“It was him. He was here. This time, I saw him. He spoke to me.”
Lester looked around and ran toward the exit. He considered going outside and looking for Jack or whoever else might have frightened his sister, but he didn’t want to leave either Constance or Damita alone. Inside the club someone was watching the two women, but it wasn’t Jack.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
“I know who you are.”
The first note was merely the beginning. Within weeks three more had been left. What Damita wasn’t sure of was whether they were targeting her or Constance. She assumed the notes were for her since they seemed to be left close to where she would normally be; whether it was her desk, her locker or her computer. If the note had read anything else, she would have believed it was nothing more than someone playing a foolish prank, but she knew better than that. Constance’s high anxiety and the notes together proved to Damita that there was more than simple paranoia going on.
Despite her initial desire to claim her independence, Damita had done a complete one-eighty and, instead, decided she might like living with Lester. They were happy and she was glad she had made the decision. She thought it was very funny when she moved in and he wrote a note in lipstick on the mirror that read I told you so. He had been saying all along that she didn’t need to find an apartment because she was going to change her mind and come live with him.
Damita came home that night, note in hand, eager to convince Lester that his sister wasn’t going crazy.
“Look what someone left on my computer today,” she said.
“If it was Jack, why would he leave it on your computer? Not only that, how would Jack get access to the office in order to be able to leave a note on anyone’s computer?”
“He could have gotten someone else to do it.”
“You’re right. Jack was a very manipulative fellow. He was capable of anything.”
“Lester, how dangerous is this guy?”
“He’s as dangerous as Neal was.”
“What are we going to do?”
“I know one thing, we’re not going to run. I’m tired of my sister running. She deserves to have a normal life.”
“Maybe the two of you should go to the police. I can’t go with you, but I’ll be there in spirit.”
“You might be right. At this point, that might be the best thing.”
Lester considered going to the police, but eventually dismissed the idea. The police represented a potential threat to Damita and Constance refused to go to the police anyway. Not only that, he was sure they wouldn’t have done anything. He knew they would have to handle the situation on their own.
The next day Damita went to work and was able to convince Constance to go as well. She was happy to see that she still had a job and they both tried their best to forget what had been going on with the notes and Constance’s feeling of being
watched.
At the end of the day, Damita and Constance left work together and decided a trip to the mall would be the thing to put both of them in a better mood. They visited multiple stores, and both promised each other they would make sure they stayed together. Suddenly, Damita too felt it. There was definitely someone following them. She attempted to use the multiple store windows to hopefully get a reflection of who was there. She saw nothing. Then, suddenly, a face appeared out of nowhere. To Damita’s surprise, it appeared to be the man that had helped her escape from the Towers. He was standing there, not moving, staring at both her and Constance. By the time she got Constance’s attention to show her the man, staring at them both, he was gone. She didn’t see him walk away. His reflection was simply no longer there.
Instead of going home, Damita stopped at Constance’s house first. They unpacked some of the things they purchase and for a moment their little shopping spree seemed to help return things to normal. That is, until they were going through the bags of items and there was another Post-It note with the same message printed on it. “I know who you are.” The note could mean anything. It could be Jack or it could be someone who knew Damita had survived nine-eleven. It could also be someone who knew she had killed her husband.
The next day, Damita decided she was done hiding and being afraid.
Damita felt and looked strong and devoid of fear. “Constance, are you ready to fight back? We need to put all of this to an end right here and now. Aren’t you done running and hiding? I know I am and you’ve certainly been at it a lot longer than I have. Instead of standing by waiting for them to find us, I say we go looking for them. Are you with me?”
On the Other Side Page 22
