Chapter 25
25
PORTER
I drove to the police station and followed Jason inside. Despite my years of illegal activities, I had never once visited the place. It was smaller than I would have thought, with an open space dedicated to desks and a series of doors in the back.
Jason nodded to a young woman sitting at a dispatch station, facing the doorway. She had a full-blown communications console in front of her with a two-way radio, three computer screens, and a keyboard. She nodded back, focused on her half of a conversation over a headset.
Jason found us an empty room and tagged another officer to take my statement. With Mike as my wingman, I gave him all the information I could recall. All I knew was that I had to start at the very beginning and that we were losing precious time. I fidgeted, shaking my knee on a pointed toe, working the hem of my shirt between my fingers.
"What was she wearing when you last saw her?" the officer asked.
"My T-shirt," I deadpanned.
"And?"
"Just that. Just my T-shirt." I looked up to the ceiling, wishing I was out there hunting for her instead of sitting in here playing games. "I'm sure she's got on jeans or something else."
"Is that what she would likely wear?" the officer asked. "Jeans?"
"Yes!" I shouted.
"Easy," Jason scolded.
I stared daggers at the table.
There was a look exchanged between Jason and the other officer, one that said, This guy is crazy . I had seen it a lot in my drinking days. The only problem with getting it now was that I wanted them to take me seriously. I was convinced that Gina was in trouble, and the longer we waited to begin the search, the worse the outcome would be. I inhaled, letting the insult roll off my shoulders. They could think what they wanted; nothing we were doing was getting us closer to finding Gina.
"Now the car," the officer began. "You said it was blue. Would you say sky blue or navy blue?"
"Navy." I took a deep breath. I reminded myself every second that they were only trying to be helpful.
"You don't have any pictures?" he asked, circling back to a point I had made several minutes ago.
"No," I said.
He typed something much longer than the word "no" onto his laptop, then spoke, paying more attention to the screen than to me. "Where does she work?"
"Westview Hospital in Nashville," I responded.
"Have you tried reaching her there?" the officer asked.
"No."
There was another silent communication between Jason and the other officer and Jason stood up. "I'll do it." He walked out of the room, leaving me alone with Mike and the douche.
"So," the officer said, "tell me why she came to visit you again?"
W hen I finally got out of the interrogation room, I was pretty sure the police thought I had killed her. It did help that Mike and Jason were vouching for me. It did not help that I was a known drug user who had just gotten out of treatment. My attempts to explain my relationship with Gina fell on deaf ears. As much as I wanted to defend our choices, it wouldn't get me any closer to determining where Gina had gone.
Jason came back into the room, tagging his fellow officer out. "Here's what we're gonna do. We put out an APB on Gina's car with the description you gave us. We're gonna send someone to her apartment in Nashville just to check on her. If we find her there, we're gonna ask her if she's okay."
"That's all I want." I exhaled in frustration. "But what if she's not there? I know you think I had something to do with this, but I promise you, I didn't. She wouldn't have left without telling me."
"I don't think you had anything to do with this, Porter, come on." Jason dropped a palm on the table, shocking me out of my grief. "Mike told me how you don't want to come around to our cookouts anymore because you think we're too good for you."
I snapped a glance at Mike, who opened his mouth to speak.
"No." Jason pointed a finger at me. "I don't think you're trash—I never thought that. If you say your girl is in trouble, I'm gonna help you find her."
My eyes softened and I let out a small noise of shock. All this time I had been thinking that I was too far gone to connect with people and that no one understood me except Gina. I had been wrong. I had friends, real friends, who believed in me and wanted to help. I refocused my energy on helping save the woman I loved.
"I'm sorry," I said, holding up my hands. "I was wrong to assume that you don't have your own shit to deal with."
"Damn straight." Jason sat back down. "As I was saying, we're gonna watch the highways and send a patrol to her door."
"What can I do?" I asked.
I could see that the answer was "nothing," but that he knew that wasn't what I wanted to hear. "Go back home," he said finally. "Let us do our jobs and we'll let you know what we find out."
I stood up. "I guess you need a lift?" I asked Mike.
"I'll get a ride with Jason," Mike said. "Just take care of yourself."
I sighed, walking out the door with no action items to attend to. It was dark already, and the hours I wasted at the police station had brought me no closer to a resolution. Maybe the officer would find her at home, and she would explain that she had developed an aversion to me. It didn't seem likely, but the scenario gave me hope. Wherever she was, I hoped she was okay.
With nothing to do and nowhere to go, my thoughts immediately bent toward getting high. It would be a perfect accompaniment to the failure of my closest relationship. I was an addict—didn't I know by now that I couldn't have anything good?
My three weeks of training in the recovery program kicked in, and I drove home to get my crisis plan. It felt wrong. I should be out turning over rocks and searching creek beds, but instead, I was dealing with my own bullshit. I told myself that calling my peer mentor was a better choice than getting drunk or high, but my heart wasn't in it. Still, I climbed the stairs to my attic room, to the last place I had seen Gina.
The sheets still smelled like her, like us. I hadn't washed them, and depending on how the night unfolded, maybe I never would. I thought about the dumpster. The trash had been emptied, but maybe my garbage bag had somehow been forgotten. Maybe it was worth a climb through the rubbish to find a hidden score.
Instead, I went straight for the bureau, where my crisis plan was lying beneath two folded shirts. I pulled out my phone and dialed the number, holding my breath until a familiar voice answered.
"Hey, this is Porter," I said. "From Westview."
"Yeah, Porter," the older man said. "I remember. How's life treating you?"
"Not so good," I answered. "I feel like I need a drink or a score."
"It'll pass."
"I need one real bad," I insisted.
"What's that gonna help? Who is that gonna help?" he argued, as if he had done it millions of times.
"Me," I snarled.
"Is it? Is it really going to help you? Or is it going to give you one more thing to be ashamed of in the morning?" His words cut me to the core. He was right; I had no business getting drunk or high. It would help no one—not the police, not Gina, and certainly not me.
"But…" I tried again, desperate to feel some relief. "I have all these feelings that I don't know what to do with."
"Talk about them," came the simple answer.
"I can't." I had already told the police the whole story; if I ratted on myself to the sober community, I would find myself with no friends left.
"Can you write them down or sketch them out?" he suggested. "You don't have to talk to me. Anyone will do."
I hesitated, and he could hear my indecision over the phone.
"Can you get to a meeting?" he offered finally.
"There's not one in Singer's Ridge," I said, thinking hard. There was only the Monday evening meeting at St. Mary's.
"Hang on." There was some shuffling at the other end of the line, then, "There's a 7:00 p.m. in Greenwood. Can you get there?"
"Yeah." I was out the door before hanging up.