Never Wake the Dead Page 3

  “But, how do you know it’s Rose.”

  “To help identify her, the detective asked me about any tattoos that she may have had.”

  “Did she?”

  “So, I told the cop about her toenails and fingernails, painted with red and white and blue nail polish. That was her style. There was a large scar on her arm, where they placed the metal plate. I also told him about the tattoo of a rose on the inside of her arm. I even told him about a bar code tattooed in the petal of that rose. That was when James asked me to come in on Monday and look at some pictures.”

  “Jesus.”

  “I know it was her. I broke down right there and cried. It was such a shame. I never knew her real name. I just called her Rose, like everyone else did.”

  "Jesus."

  "But that's not all."

  "What do you mean that’s not all?”

  “The detective said that they found another body part during the week. Whoever was doing this was leaving body parts in black bags throughout Queens Boulevard. But, I realized something when I finished speaking to the detective.”

  “What?”

  “No one is going to do anything about this.”

  “Why?”

  “Because that’s how it is. No one is going to make a big deal about it. The American police don’t care about us. In fact, the police wish some psycho would to take us out, once and for all. We are no better than the gangbangers out here. In the end, the detective told me to spread the word that we were all targets. He’s the one that’s paying me.”

  By the end of Violet’s story, Daisy was speechless. The streets of long Island City looked darker than before.

  Violet went on, “The detective mentioned there was something strange that they found with the second body part that they didn’t tell the press about.”

  “What?”

  “They found a torso in that black garbage bag. It looked like the body was chewed up and like an animal had clawed at it.”

  "What!”

  “He told me that rats got into the bag and burrowed in her chest.“

  "That's so messed up."

  "Well. What is more screwed up is trying to figure out what the killer was doing.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The killer just didn't dismember the victim right away. No way. The killer kept her for a while, doing God knows what. The victim might have died a long agonizing death, for all we know.”

  Daisy looked down the dark street, and Violet could now see the fear crawling over her face.

  "I don't want to hear any more," Daisy said. "You win. I'm out of here." And she started to walk away from under the bridge.

  Violet yelled after Daisy. "Don't you want to know what he did with her once he took her. Come on, Daisy!"

  Violet smiled, as she watched Daisy march toward Queensborough Plaza to catch the train and get out of Long Island City. Either way, Violet proved that Daisy’s stomach was weak. For now, Daisy was scared off, at least for the weekend.

  Thank God, Violet said to herself. She saved another girl, at least for a little while.

  Twenty minutes later, a car came through the stroll. Violet asked the man in a car if he was going out tonight. It meant if he was looking for a trick. He nodded. A second later, Violet slipped into an unmarked cop car and into the night she went.

  Even she had to pay the toll first.

  SUNDAY EVENING - Violet stared into the raging dark waters of the East River from the Queensborough Bridge. She smoked a cigarette, as cars flew behind her. She thought about what the police found today in Queens, another black bag with a severed body part.

  Part of her was glad that this was her last night on the street. But another part of her was just plain scared of what was out there this evening. But, there was nothing that drugs couldn’t fix, at least for one more night.

  Violet knew it was another girl like her, even though the paper never mentioned the victim’s gender.

  Every time Violet delved into the streets, she knew that she too could disappear. But, she was so close to making enough money to pay off the Coyote. Violet was almost out of the life. All she had to do was drop the money off with the Coyote at a place in Jackson Heights, and her debt paid in full.

  Tonight, Violet decided not to work on the dark industrial streets of Long Island City because the police had found another black bag. This time, they found it under the viaduct of the Queensborough Bridge, and it scared the crap out of her.

  The bag appeared in the same place where she spoke to Daisy the other night. Can you imagine that? Thinking about the coincidence made her skin crawl. Was it a coincidence or was it a sign?

  This time another dog walker found a black plastic in the middle of the street. At first, the dog sniffed and barked at the garbage bag. The owner tried to pull the dog away. But the dog would not let go until the man looked inside the bag. When he did, he found another severed body part. He was disgusted by what he found and immediately threw up, right after. The odor of death turned his stomach inside out.

  Jesus, Violet thought. Somehow, the terror had come closer to her. Who would do such a thing? She wondered why this serial killer had not attacked her, the whole month she was out here.

  Violet took another pull of her cigarette and her nose and eyes glowed for a second.

  With the police in the area, the number of johns and street walkers coming through the stroll in Long Island City dried up. But, the coyote told her about another place where Violet could make her money tonight.

  “It’s the same as before,” he told her.

  It was safe there because the cops looked the other way, as long as Violet paid the toll.

  Violet flicked the cigarette over the railing, and it disappeared into the raging dark water of the East River. She walked down the pedestrian ramp of the Queensborough Bridge and headed for a street corner in Sunnyside, where she thought she could make some cash. She headed for the street corner, close to Calvary Cemetery.

  Three hours later, Violet was making a killing at her new spot on the corner of Queens Boulevard and 51st Street, where there was small strip club a couple of doors down.

  Violet was closer than ever to reaching her goal. If she hustled a little quicker, she could probably get home before 2 am.

  As the night continued, more men were coming out of the strip club more frequently. Her strategy was simple. Approach every son of a bitch that came out of there. Most guys were drunk. So, they stumbled out the door of the club and there she was. Each time, they were ready to spend cash on a sure thing. The cops were always 5 to ten blocks away. But sometimes, they got closer to her because they liked to watch her work.

  Each time a John crossed her path, they couldn't help notice how good she looked in her tight violet dress. They stared at her firm legs and breast. Her beautiful emerald eyes enchanted them. Without fail, each one propositioned her. Most of the time, she accepted and into the night, she went. However, there were a couple of men that were too drunk for her. So she avoided them.

  Violet would have been out there on the street for another hour, but one John ended up irritating the hell out of her.

  "Get the hell away from me, you prick!”

  Violet emerged from a green mini-van on the side street that ran along the cemetery, away from the bright orange street lamps of Queens Boulevard. Her heels echoed through the night, as the john pulled up his pants and followed her out of the car. Violet walked away without looking back.

  The john looked embarrassed, over what transpired between them.

  “I’m sorry,” he yelled after her, as he adjusted his black round glasses.

  Violet stood on the corner, yelling back at him. "Are you fucking crazy, man. Get the hell out of here! Go! Go back to your car and get the hell out of here! You asshole!”

  Violet screamed so loud that the bouncer at the strip club turned to look at her.

  “Asshole! Don’t ever say that kind of shit to anyone again. I should have put my heel
down your throat for saying that.”

  The john’s face was covered half in moonlight and half in shadow. His face was pale. Quickly, he returned to the mini-van.

  Violet stayed under the bright lights and counted all the money that she made that night. Thank god, she thought. Violet counted the money, again. She made enough tonight to pay her debt to the Coyote. It was over, and she thanked God that she survived the night.

  A few minutes later, Violet saw the john drive off in his mini-van.

  After the altercation, the night was over. The mood had changed. Violet started walking down Queens Boulevard toward Woodside. Along the way, she thought about how she was going to get an actual apartment. Violet no longer needed to stay in the room where the coyote placed her for the month. She could work a little longer, but on her terms.

  Her landlady, Maria Vargas, was known as La Negra. But, Violet needed to get away from the Coyote and Maria, as soon as possible. She needed to get off their radar. Now that Violet was going to be a legal resident of the country, she could start over.

  She looked down Queens Boulevard, and there were hardly any cars on the road. Calvary Cemetery was up ahead, where a row of trees created pools of orange light and shadow on the sidewalk. She went in and out of the light with no problem, smoking a cigarette.

  Then, she paused, noticing a shadow move up ahead in a way that felt unnatural.

  Violet knew that something was moving up there by the trees next to the cemetery.

  For a moment, it looked like someone stepped backward into a shadow against the wall of the cemetery. It was something that was trying to stay out of the light.

  Violet stood still, thinking twice about walking down the sidewalk next to the wall of the cemetery that continued for several city blocks. Then, she thought about the drunk homeless guy, earlier tonight. Maybe, he was sleeping on the thin sliver of overgrown grass that ran next to the cemetery wall.

  Again, she looked down the sidewalk and into the dark corner of the cemetery wall where she thought she saw something move.

  However, everything looked still, like a photograph. Even the wind was dead. At the end of the long sidewalk, Violet no longer saw cars pass. Instead, she saw a never-ending night

  She thought about taking a step forward. But, she couldn't bring herself to continue. She looked up and down the empty sidewalk next to the cemetery.

  "Fuck this."

  Immediately, Violet headed toward the other side of the street. She tossed the cigarette and walked across Queens Boulevard with her high platform shoes. It wasn't a straight shot, either. A third of the way, she had to climb over an iron fence, the height of her hip. Two-thirds of the way across, she had to do the same thing again. When she finally made it to the other side of the street opposite of the cemetery, she straightened out her violet dress and caught her breath.

  Violet felt relieved. The street was brighter on this side. She lit another cigarette and started walking. Finally, the night was behind her. She could not wait to throw herself on the yellow couch in her small room. The bottom of her feet felt like crap, and the rest of her felt cumbersome and disgusting.

  As she walked down the boulevard, she couldn’t lose the feeling of something crawling under her skin. Then, she looked over at the cemetery. For a second, Violet felt as if something from inside the cemetery was watching her.

  Get a hold of yourself, she thought. It’s over. You’ve made it. A second later, she took another drag from her cigarette.

  Violet calmly walked down the wide sidewalk, when the street lamp above her flickered off. For a split second, the orange light went out, and there was only darkness and silence.

  Violet’s heels never made another sound. There wasn’t even a scream. When the street lamp flickered back on, Queens Boulevard was empty and devoid of life.

  In an instant, the night swept her away as if she never existed, leaving behind only a burning cigarette on the sidewalk.

  3

  Sophie Dreamed of the Sun

  At ten years old, Sophie was young, innocent and smart as a whip. The day her life changed one early morning. Sophie didn't know what she saw, but she felt that the world was far stranger than what she saw on television.

  One night, she remembered her father, John, telling her that the sunrise in New York City was always a marvelous thing to witness if she ever got up early enough.

  “But always remember,” John told his little girl. “the sun is brightest in our dreams.”

  It was early one morning, in the Borough of Queens, before the sun was out and Sophie wanted to see the sunrise like her father said.

  The night before, Sophie was excited to see the sunrise and she was going to set the alarm on her watch that her mother bought her. Then, her father told her not to use the watch.

  "How will I wake up, then?" she asked her father.

  “Use your will, to set the alarm in here,” he told her, while he touched her forehead. “When you use your will to wake up at the right time, then you will see the sunrise and your eyes will glow with light because you have done something on your own.”

  That night, she closed her eyes and thought about what time she wanted to wake up. She remembered the words that her father told her. Then, she repeated the exact time she wanted to wake up, over and over, until she fell asleep.

  "Five-fifteen. Five-fifteen. Five-fif..."

  The next morning, Sophie woke up to the sound of birds chirping in her ear. She looked out the window, and it was still night. The girl looked at the time on the clock, and it was Five-fifteen. She did it. She willed herself to wake up at the right time. It worked exactly like her father said.

  With a big smile on her face, Sophie would see the sunrise this morning. She heard some noise downstairs. Her father was up, getting ready to walk the dog before he went to work at the hospital. John was a doctor.

  Sophie looked out the window of her bedroom, up and down Skillman Avenue. The breeze felt warm. They lived across the street from the train station. Father was downstairs getting ready to leave and take the dog out for a walk.

  This morning, Sophie wanted to see the sun rise from the park down the block. From the top of the slide, she could see the red sunrise, her father told her. So she got ready and hurried down the stairs to meet him.

  Sophie’s dad looked at her smiled and gave her a nod to come along. Together, they walked out the apartment building and down Skillman Avenue that ran down all the way to the East River. In the distance, they saw the skyscrapers of mid-town Manhattan. They lived in Sunnyside, only ten minutes away on the train. She could see the buildings, as they walked down a hill. She held the dog’s leash, while her father held her other hand.

  As they walked together, she noticed the big piles of garbage on every block. Then, she asked her father, “What happens to all this garbage, papa?”

  “They take all these bags and place it on many boats, trains and trucks as they can find and take them away."

  "Really? Where?"

  "They send it to another place far away to be buried under the ground."

  "How far?"

  "A thousand miles away.”

  Sophie didn't know how far that was. But she was amazed by how much garbage the city produced.

  They walked a couple more blocks until they got to the playground. It was still dark when they were about to enter the park. However, Sophie suddenly stopped. It looked like she was scared to walk ahead for some reason. Her father bent down to look at Sophie. She stood there like a statue.

  “Sophie, what wrong?”

  Sophie pointed to a spot on the sidewalk, up ahead.

  John looked and didn’t see anything. Then, he turned back to see what was wrong with his daughter.

  Suddenly, he heard something smack loudly against the sidewalk, about four feet away. When John turned around, he saw a bag on the ground, a big black plastic bag.

  “Did you see that, papa? That bag just fell from the sky.”

  “What did yo
u say, Sophie?”

  “That black bag fell from the sky.”

  Sophie pointed at the sidewalk, where she pointed before. Her father looked at the black bag. Then, he looked up at the vast sky, then at her. It was getting lighter, and the sun was about to rise over the building in the east. But, Sophie had forgotten about that.

  Where did that bag come from?

  There were no building looming over the park. There were no open windows above the street. The sky was starting to get lighter, as he looked at the trees that swayed in the wind. He was sure that the black bag did not fall from the branches of those trees. They were too far away.

  “I’ll be damned,” he said to himself.

  “What's in that bag, Papa?”

  Then, John took a closer look at the black bag on the street, examining its shape.

  “What is that, papa?”

  There was an industrial black garbage bag on the purple concrete sidewalk. After a little while, Sophie's father noticed the outline of an elbow. He thought, possibly an arm. As a doctor, he knew the human anatomy well.

  When John realized that there was a body part in the bag, his Adam's apple sunk into his stomach and fear oozed from his pores, remembering how cruel this world can be.

  “Come on Sophie let’s go back home,” Father grabbed the dog and picked up her off the sidewalk. “Sophie we are going back home, okay?”

  Then, the girl remembered something. “But, what about the sunrise, papa?”

  John looked at the black bag and then, at her. “Tomorrow is another day.”

  For Sophie, John tried to sound confident. At once, John took her and the dog back home. The whole time, he didn’t want his daughter to realize what was in that bag.