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Continued from previous page…
Regardless of the utter madness that stood before them, the girls all instinctively knew one thing—
“We have to stick together. We can’t let this thing get out of control.”
Gina finally managed to gather her thoughts together and stand up on her feet. She rubbed her face with her hands in an attempt to clear her mind, then offered up her own, usual brand of levity.
“Well, Belinda, ya’ finally did it,” she began.
“What?” wondered Belinda, still visibly shaken by everything that surrounded her.
“You went down on a guy and sucked the life right out of him,” suggested Gina.
“Gina, I will KILL YOU!!” screamed Belinda, lunging at her.
Jane physically held her back.
“How dare you make a joke about this?!!” cried Belinda.
“Whoa, whoa, two homicides in one day,” kidded Gina. “You might want to back off.”
“Gina! Godammit!! You wanna’ stop makin’ jokes?!!” yelled Charlotte. “For once in your life, could you please stop makin’ jokes?!!”
“Hey, man, I’m just tryin’ to make light of a bad situation here,” said Gina, stating the obvious. “We got a dead body here… Now, what the fuck are we gonna do about it?”
Everyone was relatively paralyzed by Gina’s painful observation.
“Alright, alright, Gina’s right,” Charlotte realized. “First things first.. We need to find out who this jerkoff is… Where are his pants?” she asked.
“Over there in the corner,” Jane pointed out.
“Gina, go over there and dig the wallet out of his back pocket,” instructed Charlotte.
“Why do I have to do it?” asked Gina.
“Because you’re the drummer,” Charlotte mindlessly informed her.
Gina paused and testily reminded everyone,
“You know.. I’m getting pretty sick and tired of you guys using that as a legitimate excuse,” she returned.
Gina, nevertheless, did as she was told. She grudgingly walked over to the chair where the dead man’s pants were lying and started rifling through his pockets. She pulled out his wallet, found his driver’s license and revealed to the entire room:
Anton Khudobin
236 Walnut Street
Pasadena, California
It took everything they had within them to keep Kathy and Charlotte from looking across the room at each other.
“Belinda…?” questioned Gina.
Belinda looked up, completely bewildered and irritated that she was being questioned over and over. “Don’t ask me,” she said. “I’ve never heard of the guy… I don’t know who the fuck he is.”
Kathy wanted to dive at Charlotte’s throat and strangle her for putting on such a charade, and also for drilling her beloved friend with so much unnecessary interrogation.
But she had to resist.
All of a sudden, Charlotte’s evil, split-personality started to come to the surface once again.
“Belinda, how do you explain that mirror full of coke sitting next to your bed?” asked Charlotte.
“I don’t know, Charlotte! I’m telling you, I didn’t do any coke last night!” Belinda bawled. “I didn’t do anything! … How many times do I have to defend myself?!! Why don’t any of you believe me?!!”
Again, Belinda hugged Jane with all her might and buried her face into her shoulder.
“Oh, God, Jane, help me,” she wept. Belinda then whispered softly into Jane’s ear so that no one else could hear. “What are we going to do?” she asked. “You have to help me.. What if I am to blame for this?.. Please don’t let anything happen to me.”
“I won’t, baby, I won’t,” Jane assured her with the same whisper. “I’m here for you, okay? … You know that… I won’t let anything happen to you, I promise.”
The air was thick with tension. Everyone wondered what the next move was going to be. Then, in the manner in which she told Belinda that she would protect her, Jane spoke up and broke the silence.
“Well, Char… What’s it gonna be?” she asked.
With a scrunched-up face, Charlotte stood there pondering what she was going to say next.
“Well, for starters,” she began. “I suppose I should send the entire staff home for the day.”
“What?… Why?” asked Gina.
“Because I think I know what we’re going to do with the body,” answered Charlotte.