It being a Sunday afternoon there was no school. However Carmen Jockolva had the unfortunate task of participating in a meeting for her mother. Her mother, Catherine Jockolva, was a large business owner who inherited the business from her father. Although she herself was not much of a business woman she intended to make Carmen one, hence the meeting. The meeting had just started and she had already started twisting back and forth in a rolling office chair. After a few irritated glances from the members of the board she stopped. The wide glass windows let in little light due to blinds to cut the sun’s glare on particularly bright days. There was no need for them today. The room was small, just enough room for a table and enough chairs to accommodate the Board for meetings. Carmen wasn’t much of the corporate type, never was and never would be. She was just itching to get out of her white blouse, grey blazer and matching skirt and into regular clothes.
Not to mention her heels were killing her. Until then however, she would just have to sit through this meeting listening to this person drone on and on; who knows how long she’d last.
The rain had begun to die down. Walking across the building’s parking structure I found myself face to face with Jockolva Industries. Its’ double doors were shiny and waiting.
Pulling on the gold handle I walked into the company lobby and approached one of the elevators. The elevator music was tacky as usual, they should probably update those I was thinking to myself, of course then it might not be elevator music. Once on the fourth floor I was greeted by the bustle of people busy at work. At least that’s what you would think you would see in a Corporate Industry right? No, the first thing I was greeted with was at least ten people standing around a water cooler.
However, I had only just walked a few steps when an employee rounding a corner too fast knocked me over, carrying a stack of files and a coffee mug which he preceded to spill all over himself and me. The clumsy fool in question was dressed in business attire and looked to be about in his early twenties, probably an intern.
After a few minutes of fussing over his coffee stain he helped me to my feet, “If you’re trying to get first in line for the water cooler you’re a little late.” I retorted.
“I’m sorry I didn’t see you there, I was just delivering these files to accounting,” he says as he starts to gather up the scattered files.
“My name's Burt by the way.” The name Burt could be seen clearly displayed on his name tag.
“Emma,” I reply, introducing myself, “Emma Carter.”
“Well, Emma is there anything I can help you with?”
“Yes, actually I’m looking for a friend, I’m told she is in a meeting, can you help me?”
“Uh, sure what’s your friend’s name?”
“Carmen Jockolva.” At this Burt ended up dropping all his files all over again.
“Your friend is Carmen Jockolva, the heir to the Jockolva fortune?” he said his voice full of excitement and enthusiasm.
I gave a nervous half laugh, “Umm yup that’s her alright.”
“Hell yah! I’ll take you,” he put his scattered files on top of the water cooler and we were on our way.
“Ms. Jockolva is in a board meeting, all board meetings are held in a room in the back,” he said straightening his tie.
Carmen was in the process of tapping a pencil against the table when a knock came to the door interrupting someone’s presentation. All heads turned toward the sound. A man in a gray striped suit closest to the door turned to answer it, there were some whispers and then the man called out Carmen’s name. Carmen was happy for any excuse to get out of that dull setting.
“Excuse me ladies and gentlemen it seems I have an urgent matter to attend to. Please continue. Victor will you take over for me?” she said preparing to leave.
Victor was Vice President of Operations; he was also Carmen’s babysitter, as if she didn’t know. How else would her mother be getting so much information about her performance at company meetings and other similar obligations. Outside of the conference room Carmen was greeted by a soggy Emma, wet from the rain head to toe and her obviously underpaid and eager escort, Burt.
“Hi, I’m Burt, it’s a pleasure to meet you Ms. Jockolva, I work here at Jockolva Industries. I was simply assisting your friend, Ms. Carter, here in locating you.” He said all this while shaking the life out of her arm.
“Well it’s also nice to meet you and thank you for showing Emma the way.” She said relinquishing his grasp on her hand. With that Burt regretfully left to attend to other matters.
“Interns don’t get paid,” said Carmen after he left.
“Huh well no wonder then,” I said.
“Come on we can talk in the break room it’s just down the hall to the left I’ll meet you there in a second,” said Carmen.
Carmen reopened the door to the Conference room and poked her head in putting on another charming smile, “Sorry to disrupt your presentation once again, I would just like to inform all of you that I have a pressing family matter therefore will not be available all day, thank you,” and she shut the door.
In the break room I sat munching on donuts and had helped myself to a cup of coffee when Carmen walked in.
“This coffee is terrible really, someone ought to do something about it” I said swallowing a mouthful of crumbs.
“Well if it’s really that bad why are you drinking it?” asked Carmen, hopping up on the counter and picking up a donut of her own.
“Makes the donuts taste better,” I answered with a grin.
“Emma, you’re soaked. Did you walk all this way in the rain to tell me how bad our coffee is? Look at you, you’re like a walking puddle,” she said squeezing water out of my clothes. “I take that back you’re a sponge.”
“You’re getting water everywhere,” I said even though I knew she didn’t care.
“They’ll get over it; you should get out of that jacket.”
“Yes mom,” I retorted sarcastically.
“I have some dry clothes that I was going to change into after the meeting, you can put those on,” said Carmen ignoring my comment.
Carmen waited in the break room while I went in the bathroom to change. We weren’t an exact match in size but they would do, at least they were dry. Back in the break room Carmen seemed to be deep in thought.
“Hey, thanks for the clothes, hope you don’t mind but I stuffed my wet clothes back in your backpack. Is that ok?” I said entering the room.
“Yeah, that’s fine” said Carmen waking from her thoughts.
“Well now that you have the day off how ‘bout we get some grub.”
At that we both headed downstairs and out the front door lobby but every few minutes or so I would see her glance at me like she had something to say or she wanted to tell me something. Apparently Carmen was supposed to meet our friend Adam for lunch at Café Don Pablo’s so we decided to eat lunch there. As we walked across the puddle stained parking lot of Jockolva Industries Carmen got a call from our other friend Liz telling her to come pick her up. Liz lived about twenty minutes away.
Liz was found alone when she was five and with no family to claim her was put in foster care. Unfortunately no family was able to control Liz and her unique individuality. This was how she met Carmen, Adam and I, after ten years of moving from foster home to foster home she ran away to New Jersey. After befriending us, she was soon convinced to stop sleeping on the streets and to find a foster family in New Jersey, I even offered to adopt her as a sister.
Carmen didn’t have her own car, her mom wouldn’t let her have one; the car Carmen was driving actually belonged to the company. It was a silver Toyota, with leather seats!
Technically she wasn’t allowed to drive it but what her mother didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her. While on the way to pick up Liz I started to fiddle with the radio a bit. The sound of static and infomercials soon changed my mind.
Liz was already waiting by the mailbox when we pulled into her foster parent’s driveway.
“What took so long?” she called, jumping into the backseat along with a few bags.
“Traffic,” I answered. “What’s with the bags?”
“I don’t like these parents anymore I want new ones,” answered Liz bluntly.
Liz sat in the middle seat in the back of the silver Toyota, her bags piled up to the right of her. Her jet black hair, with blue streaks cut very short that barely touched her shoulders, still managed to fall across her face. She was unusually pale, not one freckle. Liz’s brown eyes stared very intently at the back of the car seat in front of her, revealing nothing. She wore a dark blue jean jacket, matching Capri, a tank top and sneakers. She wore rings on almost every finger, had four bracelets, an anklet, and eight piercings, all of them on her ears and all she had done herself.
I turned in my seat to look at her, “What do you mean you want new parents?” Carmen wanted to turn in her seat too; however, she managed a questioning yet concerned look through the rearview mirror.
“You mean you’re running away. Why?” asked Carmen from the driver’s seat.
“I told you, I don’t like them anymore. I figured I’d just chill at one of you guys’ place for a while.”
“Liz, your parents wouldn’t just let you run away, do they know you’re doing this?” At this she would not look at me.
“Liz look at me!”
“No, and they’re not my parents.” said Liz. I let out a sigh, “Liz” I said sounding exasperated.
“I’m not going back” she stated matter of fact, and I saw in her face that she spoke nothing but truth. Of course she always did tell the truth, no matter how much it hurt, made me wonder what she would look like if she lied.
“You can’t stay at my place, we’re in the process of moving,” I told her.
“You can stay with me, actually that would be great because Caitlyn and Caroline should be returning from their ski trip soon and this way I won’t be outnumbered.” Carmen offered with a grin. Carmen’s sisters were real pieces of work. Their only skill in life was knowing how to be pains in the you know where.
“Hey, Carmen? I was also wondering if I could stay over too.” I asked.
“Of course, even better.” she said.
I didn’t want to tell her why and she didn’t ask; she knew me well enough she didn’t have to. For some reason I just can’t accept my dad and this new girlfriend of his, they were getting pretty serious and yet I just couldn’t stand her. Forty minutes later the three of us found ourselves in the parking lot of Café Don Pablo’s.
“Aaah finally! I’m starved” announced Liz stretching as she got out of the car. “We’re late, do you think Adam is still here?” asked Carmen, slamming the car door shut. Just as I was about to reply that I had no idea; there he was a couple of tables ahead of us. In the outside patio of the café, at a little round table with a red umbrella, sat Adam. He was looking at his watch; it looked like he was just about to leave. We called over to him and he looked up to see us coming.
At the age of sixteen Adam stood at an even six foot. His almond shaped, honey brown eyes looked tired, like he hadn’t been sleeping. His dark brown semi longish hair seemed messed up more than usual and looked like it needed to be washed. His clothes, consisting of black jeans, t-shirt, and jacket were somewhat wrinkled. Seeing us Adam freaked, he bolted over to us managing to knock two chairs out of the way. When he got to us he grabbed me by the shoulders and gave me one of his lung crushing hugs. When he finally let go and I could breath, still holding me by the shoulders he asked me if I was ok. “Well after a hug like that…” I responded.
I searched his face yet didn’t know how to describe what I saw. I saw his eyes, his beautiful eyes and gorgeous long lashes. His strong set chin and that he was in desperate need of a haircut, yet I kind of liked the way his hair always managed to fall across his eyes. But what he was feeling or thinking, I could not tell, he was so guarded, and then I knew. “You know”, it came out almost a whisper, “How do you know?” I pushed him away. I couldn’t look at him. I wanted to run.
“Did they hurt you?” he repeated. Carmen and Liz were on top of me now, crowded around me. They were worried and wanted to know what was going on. Everyone was talking at once, it was just the three of them but I felt surrounded. I needed air. Sick of being kept in the dark, finally Carmen yelled,
“What the hell happened?”
“Snakes. They raided her house last night.” answered Adam.
Great now starts the round of hugging, I thought to myself. I needed air.
“Oh Emma, I’m so sorry, you’re not hurt are you, why
didn’t you tell me!” she said while giving me another lung crushing hug followed by Liz.
“Those Snakes should know better than to mess with you cuz I’ll beat the crap out of them,” said Liz.
“Err that’s great Liz but I have to take another breath sometime. But really guys I’m fine, they broke my window, that’s it.”
I hated this, never really was one for pity parties. Don’t get me wrong hugs are great and all but when it’s for stuff like this they tend to lose their appeal. I’m supposed to be strong, independent; I’m not supposed to be the one in need of hugs to make me feel better. I will never let pity hugs or the Snakes make me feel weak. The only hugs that ever used to make me feel better were my mother’s, nonjudgmental, compassionate and gone. She made me feel safe; with her I couldn’t be touched. By now we had all ordered and decided to eat inside at a booth. The place was warm and inviting.
“How did you know?” I asked when I had gotten over my surprise, after all I had told no one, as far as I was concerned it never happened; till he showed up.
“Uh wha?” answered Adam, his mouth half full of cheeseburger.
“Ugh, gross! Chew with your mouth closed!” said Liz tossing a french fry at him.
“How did you know?” I repeated even louder this time to make sure he would hear me.
“I’ve got connections,” he shrugged and that’s all he would say to that.
Conversation soon changed to the sleepover we had planned for tonight and what kind of movies we all wanted to rent. It looked like we were in for an all night junk food bash; pizza and movie marathon.
“Horror!” screeched out Carmen, throwing her arms in the air to show her enthusiasm.
“Romance,” Liz announced diplomatically.
I threw in ‘comedy’, laughter sounded nice. We argued for a few short minutes but we all knew that it would it end up being a little bit of everything so we claimed ‘romance’ to ensure a long overdue girls night. There was no way Adam was going to be able to crash our party now knowing we would be watching what he referred to as “chic-flicks”. Oh no, he was way too macho for that. We even had the audacity to pretend to have our feelings hurt that he wouldn’t be joining our movie marathon.
“Aaww Adam, are you sure you don’t want to watch movies with us?” teased Carmen.
“Yah Adam maybe you’ll learn something,” Liz laughed at him.
“I’m not going anywhere near a bunch of mushy tearjerkers and you crazies.” He made it sound like doing so would be giving up and arm and a leg. We all laughed at this, Adam just being Adam. He never failed us; he was someone to rely on, even if it was to call us ‘crazy’.
We headed out into the alleyway deciding to walk over to the video store after saying our goodbyes to Adam. The alleyway was dark and dank, making it hard to see. It wasn’t raining but water fell off of the fire escapes above us and there were puddles splattered from the morning’s rain. I could hear the pit pat splash of our feet on pavement echoing off the narrow alleyway.
We were halfway there when a shadow-like figure caught my attention. About two yards in front of us, it moved swiftly next to the farthest fire escape. What I found strange was that it was there one moment and gone the next. It sort of shimmered and there it was again, the strangeness of it stopped me where I stood. I turned to look beside me wondering if my friends had just seen what I had seen but they had not stopped, they just kept walking.
“Guys wait! Come here, do you see that?” “Emma what are you doing its freezing out here, let’s go” called Liz.
“Just come here!” I knew it was cold but I wanted them to hurry before whatever it was disappeared again.
“Ok, ok but let’s make it quick, what’s your issue anyway?” asked Liz.
“What do you see?” I asked pointing towards where I saw the shimmering figure.
“Emma there’s nothing there but the fire escape” answered Carmen, a bit impatient now.
“So you guys don’t see anything?” as I continued to stare at the figure.
“Why, what do you see?” they asked.
The shimmering figure hadn’t disappeared again. I could
see it perfectly clear. So why was it that I could see it and not them? “Nothing lets go”.
I started walking faster now which pleased Carmen and Liz. Before we knew it the video store was right in front of us. As we entered the video store, a song was playing on the speakers. ‘I’ll still follow you home,’ was part of the lyrics. It was by one of my favorite bands. After jumping at shadows or, rather seeing shadows jump at me; I would have liked nothing more than anything but that song at that moment. It was such a stalker song.
“Let’s just get the movies and go okay?” I suggested. ‘Just to follow you home.’ Carmen and Liz seemed cool with that idea, splitting in search of their movies’, while I headed toward the comedy section. I scanned the shelves, one video had a picture of a woman covered in mud with two children on either side of her, angelic little smiles lighting up their faces. It was about a woman who discovers the joy of parenting …pass. Why was it, I thought, that comedy felt the need to display children as a form of torture against adults? Not only comedy but children were being used more and more often in horror movies, for a very different reason however. Children have always been seen as the source of pure innocence and seeing pure innocence corrupted or tainted scares people. Now, I didn’t know much about parenting, but I did have seven brothers and they were anything but innocent.
Glancing at another video I saw that it had Jackie Chan in it. It wasn’t recent but you could never go wrong with Jackie Chan. (For any of you who have never seen the first Rush Hour SHAME ON YOU) In this one he plays a cop, and is teamed up with Chris Tucker who plays a cop from New York in rescuing a little girl in a hostage situation. Then I saw it, “There you are,” I said smiling, Abbot and Costello, the real heart of comedy.
Just then Liz and Carmen came striding up arguing over the movies they had picked out. Liz had picked out The Notebook, one of the greatest classic love stories of all time, while Carmen had grabbed Pinocchio’s Revenge. Carmen’s theory was in order to watch the movies she picked out you had to have the right personality, and what is the right personality you ask? It’s the brilliant combination of horror, suspense, sometimes gore, and the ability to find it all entertaining. In Carmen’s opinion horror movies were the easiest to make fun of, and she was right.
We were on our way towards the front to check out when Liz decided to exchange The Notebook for a new movie that had just come out that was equally romantic. Liz liked to put on a tough act but when it came to little things like picking out movies it was easy to see inside she was just another scared kid in a messed up world. She believed everyone deserved to be loved. Secretly I believed she did this to make up for all the dead beat foster parents that never loved her, and then instantly hated myself for it. Liz was special. She made you feel special. She loved with all her heart, never asking for anything in return; she was also young and naïve. I didn’t want her to turn into me.
The store was closing so the back of the store was completely empty. They had even turned some of the lights off in their eagerness to close. Liz had already grabbed the new movie and was going to put The Notebook back where she 36 found it. So she headed toward the back of the store to the section where they had turned off all the lights. The back of the store was completely deserted; everyone was at the front either checking out or getting ready to. After finding the ‘N’ section on the bottom shelf she found the empty space where she had taken the movie from the shelf and put it back. As she was standing back up, turning around she fell straight back to the floor. It was so quiet back there, strange that she hadn’t heard a thing. She put her hand to her chest to calm herself. In her fright she had knocked over one of the shelves so movies were strewn across the floor. Standing before Liz, was a young, very tall, dark skinned boy with gorgeous cheekbones and the cutest dimples she had ever seen.
“Don’t you know better than to sneak up on people?” said Liz getting to her feet.
“Sorry, I hadn’t meant to scare you,” said the boy looking sheepish.
“Correction, you didn’t scare me, you startled me as in I wasn’t expecting to turn around and poof suddenly there you are, startled, get it?”
“Yeah I get it, look I am sorry,” he said flashing a movie star smile, “I was just returning this movie,” he held it up as if for proof. It was Night of the Living Dead. Whoever he was, he had an accent, sounded Brazilian.
“Mhmm. So you’re a zombie man huh? I’m more into things that don’t come back to life after it’s dead, if you catch my drift. He laughed, “Yeah I guess you could say that, by the way my name is Fu.”
“Elizabeth,” she replied shaking his hand. Liz was pleased at how interested he seemed to be in her. His eyes never left hers for a second. She would have thought it was creepy except he seemed so friendly. “Fu? What kind of name is that?” questioned Liz
“A long story which I would love to tell you sometime,” replied Fu laughing again.
“Well Elizabeth, I know I startled you but to tell the truth I’m glad I did. It has been really nice talking to you.
Maybe we could do this again some time?” He looked around the store as if he had forgotten he was there. “Well, you know what I mean. You, me, a movie, minus the store, how about it?” he gave her another award winning smile.
“Yeah maybe,” she answered then realized he was waiting for her to give him her number. “Give me your hand,” she said. He did so obediently. Pulling out a pen she scratched a number onto his palm. “If you ever feel like giving me a call you can reach me here.”
“I’ll call you, Elizabeth,” said Fu; he seemed to like the sound of her name.
“That’s what they all say,” said Liz, starting to walk away.
“Liz, how long does it take for you to put away a movie? The store is about to close let’s go!” said Carmen grabbing her arm and steering her towards checkout.
“I met a guy,” said Liz.
“You mean that guy?” said Carmen pointing to a rugged guy near the entrance of the video store; a man with a gold medallion around his neck, shaggy dirty blond hair and scruffy beard. Along with some raggedy clothes, he looked like a regular hobo. The guy had no style at all really, that stupid clunky medallion around his neck looked utterly ridiculous and he could really use a shower.
“Eww no, the guy I met was in the back of the store and he’s not a creepy hobo; he should be right behind me,” said Liz, looking around.
“Liz, there’s no one back there, who you see right now is all that’s left,” I told her.
“No, that’s impossible; the front door is the only way out, you had to have seen him. Tall hottie, probably Brazilian; sound familiar?” probed Liz. By now we had paid for our movies and were on our way out with Liz still trying to convince us her mysterious stranger was real. “Ya’ll had to have seen him, ya’ll must be lying, this isn’t funny,” said Liz, convinced of sabotage. This is certainly something we would do, however in this case we could plead innocent. In Liz’s frustration a slight southern accent surfaced, as it did on many occasions; where it came from however no one knew for Liz had spent her entire life in the city.
“Liz, if anyone’s lying it’s you because we did not see this guy of whom you speak.” I said as we began to pull into Carmen’s driveway. “Whoa,” said Liz, her comeback forgotten.
“What?”
“Nothing, it’s just bigger than I remember,” explained Liz, looking at the house as if she were a tourist. It was a two story house, three if you counted the basement. The steps of the house started at the front then rounded all the way around towards the back. Black and white painted brick enclosed the entire outer wall of the house. The entryway was shielded by two French columns. “It was built by my grandfather before he died,” said Carmen.
“The place is completely dark. Is anyone even here?” I Asked.
“Relax I have the keys, and I don’t know, Caitlyn and Caroline should be back from their ski trip, unfortunately,” answered Carmen.
Walking in the side door, the kitchen floor shone like the stars on a summer’s night. Liz tossed her bags on the counter along with the movies. “Yo, I vote brownies,” I said as I started grabbing a box from the cabinet. Carmen then took it from me and began reading the directions, tossing it back she added,
“And I vote that you make them.”
“Eeeeww what are they doing here?” It was Caitlyn and Caroline, the ‘ they’ they were referring to was Liz and me, although they were not too fond of Carmen either.
“They are staying over so get over it fast,” said Carmen. Liz stuck her tongue out just for spite. Being the major skanks that they were and not wanting to let up so easily, Caitlyn and Caroline stooped so low as to spill coffee all over Liz’s bags, not the least bit sneaky. Carmen and I had to hold Liz back.
That is one fifteen